The Indian media and entertainment (M&E) industry has seen a resurgence of advertising spending and has registered a growth of 11% last year as compared to 1.4% in 2009. All sectors, except the film industry, witnessed double digit growth last year. The film industry witnessed a decline in revenues as content did not make a strong run at the box office.
The M&E industry is witnessing a shift in favour of digital technologies as Direct to Home touched 28 million net subscribers and digital music sales surpassing the physical format. Interestingly, regional print media is attracting lot of interest from advertisers and private equity firms.
Overall, the Indian M&E industry grew from R587 billion in 2009 to R662 billion last year and is projected to increase to R1,275 billion by 2015, at a CAGR of 14%. While television and print will continue to dominate the Indian M&E industry, sectors like gaming, digital advertising and animation have tremendous potential to grow. The report underlines that by 2015, television is expected to account for almost half of the Indian M&E industry revenue and more than twice the size of print, the second largest media sector.
The Indian newspaper market is one of the largest, with more than 107 million copies, surpassing China, and accounts for more than 20% of all dailies in the world. However, the industry is highly fragmented, with 77,600 newspapers in multiple language and, as of 2010, there were 613 pending newspaper requests for registration.
Rising literacy and low print media penetration offer significant headroom for growth and higher potential for advertising revenues.
