FTA …to be or not to be

FTA. This magical and mystical Garden of Eden for eyeball and revenue seems to be the most in-demand piece of real estate in the television industry.

The platform has come a long way, from it once being a domain of only the state-run broadcaster Doordarshan, followed by the DTH lot and then the unknown players trying their hand in the world of television. Even large networks tried focussing their attention on it to reach out to good content-deprived audiences who are now considered the Gen Z of linear television (not based on age but on the need for good content)

The FTA space, a few years ago, was populated with multiple players led by large networks like Star (now Disney), Zee, Sony, and Viacom18. All had their leading channels driving the eyeball pie and revenue pie with offering from their library that was highly successful on their PAY mainline channels. Revenues also came in fast and thick. What it also unleashed was the syndication of old content for very good returns as ad bucks. Top two channels clocked in an excess of Rs 700-800 crores while the other relevant three-four got another Rs. 500 crores. This resulted in the pie size becoming as big as Rs. 1200-1300 crores in just the Hindi GEC FTA space.

Then Star Bharat stepped up and decided to invest in original content and to build a brand that was hybrid and that catered to both worlds of Pay and FTA. It did eventually become a successful brand and also became No. 1 in the space. Then came about a common agenda to build PAY revenues and not let content be available on alternate platform at no cost.  So, the big broadcasters left the space to anchor and build the distribution revenue side of the business leaving the FTA space in a void. This void worked to the benefit of who stayed back and flourished. While Dangal managed to grab the lion’s share, Magic followed distantly.

Covid in 2020 did rock the boat for all of us. Revenues dipped but ratings soared, and in the middle of all this economic crisis and the pandemic, the prodigal son of broadcasting, Doordarshan, temporarily rose like a Phoenix and settled into dust as soon as the mytho-Gods ran out of episodes.

But this offered a glimpse into the value that could be unlocked from these markets and on the DD-Free Dish platform. This opened the floodgates for all those who left the space to build a stronger PAY channel revenue, to return. Four months post return, the DD-FTA space is flourishing again with the GRP pie back to its former glory. The revenues are also back and are now stronger.

Now that the FTA world has once again been created and it generates 600 GRPS a week amongst the Hindi-GEC, what is the way forward? Will old library content or self-syndication be the way of life or will once again someone or few break the ranks and create original content for the GenZ of the Hindi speaking audiences? It has been done before successfully. Will history repeat itself? Or is status-quo better business? Short-term vs solid-long term? Will the esteemed broadcasters rethink again? 

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