The Jiostar of India pours $ 10 billion into content while streaming warms up
India’s Media Colossus Jiostar doubles the investments in content and this year will collapse around $ 3.6 billion to program, with plans to further increase the expenses in 2026, according to Vice chairman UDay Shankar.
Speaking on Mumbai’s inaugural World Audio Visual Entertainment Summit (Waves), Shankar revealed the aggressive content strategy of the company, while the explosive growth potential of the MediaMarkt of India is emphasized.
“In 2024, the company spent [INR]25,000 crores [$3 billion] Only on content. In 2025 that number went to [INR]30,000 crores [$3.6 billion]and the number next year will be over [INR]32,000-35,000 crores [$3.8-4.1 billion]”Shankar told interviewer Vivek Couto of Media Partners Asia.” We have spent more than $ 10 billion in three years. ”
Since the merger of $ 8.5 million of the JIO platforms from Reliance with Disney’s Indian assets, Jiostar has been the skan -skeptics by growing both the traditional payment in TV and streaming companies. The company now has half a billion platform visitors, although Shankar refused to confirm specific subscribers, who were last registered at 200 million in April.
“The story was that Pay TV is dead. The story was that the Premium streaming space is a limited space of 15-20 million subscribers,” said Shankar. “Pay TV has added numbers, no lost numbers since we met, because we are very focused.”
About the importance of affordability on the Indian market, Shankar emphasized: “If you only sell to 15-20 million people, you can praise it at any desired value. But if your ambition is to bring it to 300 million or a half billion people, you must keep their affordability and center in your strategy.”
He has credited the price sensitivity as an important engine of the media growth of India. “The full explosive growth of cable and satellite television in this country has happened because the leaders of the cable and satellite industry have kept price sensitivity in the market. And we must be price sensitive.”
Shankar criticized media companies worldwide for not innovating monetization models. “Seventy years ago, newspapers took ads and charging subscription. Even today the newest media company still does subscription and advertisements,” he noted.
He predicted that the India’s Video Entertainment market of $ 30 billion could double within five years if companies pursue a deeper distribution and develops content that is specially tailor -made for the Indian public. “There is a need to go deeper and to create new brands,” said Shankar, with the emphasis on opportunities in Tier Three and Four Cities.
The executive power has also tackled the theatrical market challenges of India and noted that although the Hindi language Bollywood has struggled, South Indian film industries continue to thrive a divergence that he attributed to content evolution that does not pace with changing public preferences in the North.
Looking ahead, Shankar insisted on regulators to prevent homogenizing instructions on different platforms from having homogenized. “If the media companies are not innovated enough, the supervisors are further behind,” he noticed. “You continue to hear conversations about” all screens must be treated immediately “… but you can’t do that. Then you will kill the value in both companies.”
