MUMBAI: Looking to leverage the exponential rise in “second screen” content consumption in India, Kurate Digital Consulting has joined hands with Rootanian for the production of digital sports content.
“As more and more cricket heroes are emerging the propensity to consume cricket on digital platforms are going to increase exponentially. Soccer leagues like the EPL, UEFA Champions League also have a strong following on digital platforms. Domestic leagues in other sports, kabaddi, hockey and sensitivity to develop sports talent in major Olympic disciplines are going to provide the impetus, and the appetite to consume sports will only grow in the country. Brands love to associate with digital sports content as more consumers become mobile first content consumers,” says Uday Sodhi of Kurate Digital Consulting.
With increasing internet and smartphone penetration in India, digital videos accounted for 20% share of the sports rights pie in 2019, and is expected to grow to 40% by 2024. Sports monetization on television as well as digital will be robust, driven by a number of factors, including the addition of more than 250 million broadband subscribers over 2019-2024, as per Media Partners Asia.
“With all the major sporting events resuming their LIVE telecast including cricket and EPL there is going to be a rush for digital sports content to compensate for shortfall in revenue and period of inactivity. All kinds of promotional deals and sponsorships are going to resume in full swing and that’s a big impetus to digital sports content producers, says Rootanian’s Naina Toor, a seasoned creative director & media professional in sports and entertainment.
The genesis of the collaboration Kurate and Rootanian is to create branded content which will leverage the expertise of Sodhi and Ms Toor (both senior ex-employees of Sony Pictures Network India and with over a decade of successful careers in the media and digital industry and creative content & direction respectively), within a sports context to provide scale and drive engagement across social and other channels as per the defined marketing objectives.
Advertising funded programmes are another focus area of this partnership. One of the recent offerings of the collaboration is ‘Viru ki Baithak’ featuring Virender Sehwag, a daily morning show on ‘Facebook Watch’ which focused on cricket with interesting trivia and match analysis, around the just concluded Indian Premer League.
