MUMBAI: Media major Discovery Communications has confirmed its intent to enter the sports broadcast arena in India.
The move, the outlines of which are seriously vague at present, represents a major challenge for an infotainment network that has entered the sports arena very late in life, last July agreeing to cough up $1.1 billion to fully acquire pan European network Eurosport.
Arthur Bastings, president and managing director, Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific, told Business Standard: “India is a top-priority market for us. It is an investment destination. I see enormous potential in terms of growth in the existing products we have.
Infotainment, however, is not something we will be exclusively focusing our attention on in India. We will broaden our horizons and look at areas such as general entertainment, sports, regional entertainment etc. I expect to be doing more things in India from an inorganic point of view, going forward.”
Digital will be the other major focus area.
Said Bates: “The other bit is digital, given that India is a young market with a high millennial population. We want to engage in the digital opportunity here in a big way.
“As far as inorganic is concerned, we are open to where opportunities are. But they need to be the right ones and ones that we can execute well.
