Company is reviewing its strategic options in India, the world’s most populous nation and one of the entertainment industry’s most challenging developing markets.reported Tuesday that the conglomerate has spoken with at least one bank to discuss options on how to make its India business grow, while also seeing the cost burden shared. These options could include a sale of the business or a joint venture, the paper says.Disney has spent heavily to buy a sizable market position in India.
In India, the leapfrogging move to mobile broadband delivery of video services, which has brought with it tens of millions of new TV households, has also opened the doors to significant new competitors. Some of these are nimble local players, others are local-foreign ventures. The biggest challenger is, part of the Viacom18 cluster, which is backed by Reliance industries and India’s richest businessman Mukesh Ambani.
The Indian streaming market is also a low ARPU and highly price sensitive one. Disney+ Hotstar India has subscription revenue of just $0.59 per month per subscriber.