Ep #8 | WTF is Going on in the World of Content | w/ Nikhil, Ajay Bijli, Vijay S. & Sajith S.

1. 0:00 – 1:40

   Intro

   1. NKNikhil Kamath0:00

      Let's establish market size.

   2. ABAjay Bijli0:02

      Box office-wise, 70% of the revenues-

   3. NKNikhil Kamath0:04

      Mm

   4. ABAjay Bijli0:04

      ... come from multiplexes.

   5. NKNikhil Kamath0:06

      Is OTT growing on the back of theaters?

   6. SPSpeaker0:08

      [clears throat] Sure.

   7. ABAjay Bijli0:09

      The actors fees, what percentage of the budget?

   8. SPSpeaker0:11

      Anywhere between 20 to 50% of that. I think, I think we've got to change that. Why is it wrong for a celebrity to make money? Why is it an issue?

   9. NKNikhil Kamath0:21

      [upbeat music] How do you greenlight original content?

   10. ABAjay Bijli0:25

       Uh, creativity and commerce is something that should happen hand in-

   11. SPSpeaker0:28

       Hand in hand

   12. ABAjay Bijli0:29

       ... hand in hand.

   13. SSSajith Sivanandan0:29

       I think short form-

   14. NKNikhil Kamath0:31

       Mm

   15. SSSajith Sivanandan0:32

       ... gives you a higher likelihood of success.

   16. SPSpeaker0:35

       What do you have to give that's different?

   17. SSSajith Sivanandan0:37

       The creator becomes-

   18. SPSpeaker0:39

       The dis- the distribution

   19. SSSajith Sivanandan0:40

       ... the product and the distribution. [upbeat music]

   20. NKNikhil Kamath0:50

       Hi, everyone. Uh, [chuckles]

   21. ABAjay Bijli0:53

       Hi.

   22. NKNikhil Kamath0:53

       I like how I'm sitting with the three of you and pretending to know what I'm doing here. [chuckles]

   23. SPSpeaker0:57

       [chuckles]

   24. SSSajith Sivanandan0:58

       It's, uh, two of us then.

   25. NKNikhil Kamath0:59

       Huh? [laughing]

   26. SPSpeaker1:01

       [laughing] That's true.

   27. NKNikhil Kamath1:01

       Hotstar makes plenty of content. Uh, another interesting fact that I realized today is the three of you did not know each other before today.

   28. ABAjay Bijli1:10

       No, that's right.

   29. NKNikhil Kamath1:11

       And, uh, how strange is that, that the head of the largest multiplex company, the largest streaming company, and the largest talent company of India do not know each other?

   30. SSSajith Sivanandan1:23

       I mean, I, I knew of both of them. [laughing] Just I'm pretty sure they had no clue about me. Just, just to... [laughing]
2. 1:40 – 3:52

   How Nikhil crossed paths with each Guest

   1. SSSajith Sivanandan1:40

      [laughing]

   2. ABAjay Bijli1:40

      At one level, it shows the diversity of the industry-

   3. NKNikhil Kamath1:43

      Yeah

   4. ABAjay Bijli1:43

      ... as well, isn't it?

   5. SPSpeaker1:44

      Absolutely.

   6. NKNikhil Kamath1:45

      And I met the-

   7. ABAjay Bijli1:45

      In their own field. [chuckles]

   8. NKNikhil Kamath1:47

      I met the three of you in the most interesting ways possible.

   9. SPSpeaker1:49

      That's right.

   10. ABAjay Bijli1:50

       Yeah.

   11. NKNikhil Kamath1:50

       I met Ajay many, many years ago at a common friend's Diwali party. Neeraj's Diwali, right?

   12. SSSajith Sivanandan1:57

       That's right, Neeraj Kanwar.

   13. NKNikhil Kamath1:58

       Neeraj's Diwali party in Delhi.

   14. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00

       Yeah.

   15. NKNikhil Kamath2:01

       And we sat and we spoke for a long time, and ate food, and stuff like that, and then we've always kept in touch. Sajith is, uh, again, a friend from Bangalore. I knew him when he was the CEO of Google Pay-

   16. ABAjay Bijli2:12

       Okay

   17. NKNikhil Kamath2:12

       ... which is what he did.

   18. ABAjay Bijli2:13

       I should head it.

   19. NKNikhil Kamath2:15

       [chuckles]

   20. SSSajith Sivanandan2:15

       CEO is a big term. [chuckles]

   21. NKNikhil Kamath2:17

       Which is what he did before being the CEO of Hotstar. Vijay and I, uh, we met on this random night in Bombay. So I was walking down Bandra and, uh, it was raining, and I had an umbrella with me and-

   22. SPSpeaker2:33

       Uh-huh

   23. NKNikhil Kamath2:34

       ... there was this guy with all these Bollywood actresses walking on the other side of the road. [laughing]

   24. SPSpeaker2:38

       [laughing] Not true.

   25. NKNikhil Kamath2:39

       And you were, like, being very cozy with all of them. [laughing]

   26. SSSajith Sivanandan2:43

       Sounds like a movie that Ajay would make. [laughing]

   27. NKNikhil Kamath2:45

       Yeah. [laughing]

   28. SPSpeaker2:46

       And you would definitely stream. [laughing]

   29. SSSajith Sivanandan2:48

       I probably would.

   30. NKNikhil Kamath2:49

       Yeah.
3. 3:52 – 9:02

   The Birth of PVR: Ajay Bijli’s story

   1. NKNikhil Kamath3:52

      [chuckles]

   2. SSSajith Sivanandan3:52

      ... I, I want, I want, like, the- [laughing]

   3. NKNikhil Kamath3:54

      No, I just-

   4. SSSajith Sivanandan3:54

      ... senior statesman of the industry to start.

   5. SPSpeaker3:56

      I was just like-

   6. SSSajith Sivanandan3:57

      The senior most.

   7. SPSpeaker3:58

      Wow.

   8. SSSajith Sivanandan3:59

      Start there.

   9. ABAjay Bijli4:00

      Just when I was starting to feel like... [laughing]

   10. SSSajith Sivanandan4:02

       Audacious. [laughing]

   11. ABAjay Bijli4:05

       Uh, my traditional family business has been Amritsar Transport Company, uh, which my grandfather started. His, his name was Bijlee Pehelwan.

   12. SSSajith Sivanandan4:12

       Oh, wow!

   13. ABAjay Bijli4:12

       And a lot of people thought that he was a wrestler, but he wasn't. Uh, he used to promote wrestling. And, uh, so that's how, uh, my father started... He started the trucking company, my father took it over, and I was supposed to, like a Punjabi boy, boy, you know, studied in modern school, Bara Khamba, then Hindu, where you went, uh, to just take over the trucking company. So, uh, basically, um, uh, my father was into arbitration. He used to settle a lot of, uh, family disputes and all that. And in that one arbitration, he picked up Priya Cinema-

   14. SSSajith Sivanandan4:46

       Mm-hmm

   15. ABAjay Bijli4:46

       ... which is a cinema in Vasant Vihar. And, uh, I couldn't make head or tails of the trucking company. So when I finished Hindu in '88, and I joined the trucking company for two years, and I made a disaster of it. I just, uh, wasn't very comfortable. So I just spoke to my father and I said, "Can I do something, uh, to the cinema?" Because cinema was a little decrepit. It was showing B- You know, you used to have, you would have first release movies, and you had second release movies. So second release movies used to get played there. So that's how my business journey started. So, so '90, uh, I, I started, uh, you know, renovating the cinema.

   16. SSSajith Sivanandan5:21

       Yeah.

   17. ABAjay Bijli5:22

       Uh, there were two, three influencers-

   18. SSSajith Sivanandan5:23

       Amazing

   19. ABAjay Bijli5:23

       ... in my life. One was, uh, Sterling Cinema in Bombay-

   20. SSSajith Sivanandan5:26

       Mm

   21. ABAjay Bijli5:26

       ... which was run by the Tatas, can you believe it? They had one cinema, which was brilliant. It had the only Dolby. And then there was a cinema called Chanakya in Delhi-

   22. SSSajith Sivanandan5:34

       Of course

   23. ABAjay Bijli5:34

       ... and which used to play only English movies. So English movies used to be, only three cinemas used to play, and because... People used to think that movies come very late to India. The reason they used to come late is because the houses, they used to call cinema houses at that time, were only very few. So therefore, if a Pretty Woman did well, it ran for 30 weeks.

   24. SSSajith Sivanandan5:53

       Wow!

   25. ABAjay Bijli5:53

       So there used to become a backlog. So that's the little opportunity I found, where maybe if I play Hollywood movies in that demographic, maybe, you know, I'll get the movies. Plus, there was a big issue of, without boring you guys-... Hindi movies used to be in these celluloid-

   26. VSVijay Subramaniam6:08

       Mm.

   27. ABAjay Bijli6:08

       -uh, canisters, and they used to be fifty thousand rupees a print, and now it's not even, like, thousand rupees because it's all digitized. So it was very difficult to get, uh, prints at that time. So I, I started with Hollywood movies. For two years, I ran Priya, and with the grace of God, it did, it did well, and-

   28. VSVijay Subramaniam6:23

       Oh, yeah.

   29. ABAjay Bijli6:24

       And, uh-

   30. VSVijay Subramaniam6:24

       It was always buzzing-
4. 9:02 – 14:31

   Vijay’s unconventional journey into entertainment

   1. NKNikhil Kamath9:02

      and do something. [chuckles]

   2. VSVijay Subramaniam9:03

      Yeah.

   3. NKNikhil Kamath9:03

      Would you like to go next?

   4. VSVijay Subramaniam9:04

      Yeah, let's keep the highs going. [laughing] When it comes to me, it will be a little bit of a-

   5. ABAjay Bijli9:07

      Come on, we're going to hit that in the college list of yours very, very soon.

   6. VSVijay Subramaniam9:11

      My introduction is not as exciting as that. The most exciting part of my introduction is I stumbled onto this business because-

   7. NKNikhil Kamath9:19

      Start at childhood.

   8. VSVijay Subramaniam9:20

      Childhood, son of an, son of an army officer. Uh, so born during the peak of Operation Blue Star, hence the name Vijay.

   9. ABAjay Bijli9:30

      [chuckles]

   10. VSVijay Subramaniam9:30

       Because my mom delivered me actually alone, uh, in an army nursing home.

   11. ABAjay Bijli9:36

       Wow!

   12. NKNikhil Kamath9:37

       Wow.

   13. VSVijay Subramaniam9:37

       Uh, they asked me, um... My doctor was a Sardar, Dr. Gulati, and he had asked, uh, you know, birthmarks-

   14. ABAjay Bijli9:45

       Mm

   15. VSVijay Subramaniam9:45

       ... important, right? Because it's Bhinderwala, and it's curfew, and all of that's going on. So Gulati sir said, "Your son has come with his own, own birthmark," which is where-

   16. ABAjay Bijli9:55

       Yeah

   17. VSVijay Subramaniam9:55

       ... the double thumb-

   18. NKNikhil Kamath9:56

       Oh!

   19. VSVijay Subramaniam9:56

       -comes into play. Uh-

   20. ABAjay Bijli9:58

       Incredible

   21. VSVijay Subramaniam9:58

       ... "And he's very lucky," he told my mom this. And, of course, we kept shifting cities, cities over time. Settled in Bangalore in '95, that's when my dad retired. Uh, and, uh, started in 2000, stumbled on the opportunity of managing a band, uh, in my 11th standard. Uh-

   22. ABAjay Bijli10:21

       So 11th standard, you were managing the band?

   23. VSVijay Subramaniam10:22

       I was manag- because I, all, my friends always said I have the gift of the gab.

   24. ABAjay Bijli10:26

       [chuckles]

   25. VSVijay Subramaniam10:26

       I don't know whether that's true or not.

   26. NKNikhil Kamath10:28

       No.

   27. VSVijay Subramaniam10:28

       They always thought that-

   28. NKNikhil Kamath10:28

       We'll get to know after the end of the conversation. [laughing]

   29. VSVijay Subramaniam10:30

       I guess. They always... So my best friend always tells me, "Dude, you can sell ice to an Eskimo."

   30. ABAjay Bijli10:35

       [chuckles]
5. 14:31 – 23:14

   The Uncanny CEO of Hotstar

   1. SSSajith Sivanandan14:31

      There it is.

   2. NKNikhil Kamath14:31

      Sajith, would you like to go next?

   3. SSSajith Sivanandan14:32

      I mean, there isn't... You know, from the highs, now let's plumb the depths. [chuckles]

   4. NKNikhil Kamath14:35

      The best for the last.

   5. SSSajith Sivanandan14:36

      Yeah. No, no, no. Uh-

   6. NKNikhil Kamath14:38

      The most uncanny CEO of Hotstar. [chuckles]

   7. SSSajith Sivanandan14:40

      Yeah, no, no, definitely the most, uh, sort of unnatural choice. I'm from Kerala, but I, I grew up in Delhi. And, uh, growing up, uh, I have to say, I was, like, n-n-not even a first-class student. I mean, I sucked at it.

   8. NKNikhil Kamath14:54

      [chuckles]

   9. SSSajith Sivanandan14:54

      Uh, but I loved playing sports, right? Like, I, I, I played cricket and all kinds of sports, just, like, enjoyed playing. Uh, and I did that, and I went through school, college. I actually did a master's as well. Uh, did an MBA in, uh, in Delhi, and then started working at Star TV, right? Uh-

   10. NKNikhil Kamath15:15

       When did you start?

   11. SSSajith Sivanandan15:16

       '96, '96, and I was selling Channel V, which... So these are early days. Cable TV has just joined, and, and those days it was Rupert's empire, right?

   12. NKNikhil Kamath15:25

       How old are you now, Sajith?

   13. SSSajith Sivanandan15:26

       50.

   14. NKNikhil Kamath15:27

       You don't look it.

   15. SSSajith Sivanandan15:28

       [chuckles] Uh...

   16. NKNikhil Kamath15:29

       Both of you, actually.

   17. SSSajith Sivanandan15:30

       Is that right?

   18. NKNikhil Kamath15:30

       This side of the table is aging faster than it should. [laughing]

   19. VSVijay Subramaniam15:35

       Yeah. [laughing]

   20. SSSajith Sivanandan15:35

       I think-

   21. VSVijay Subramaniam15:35

       I'm going Benjamin Button.

   22. SSSajith Sivanandan15:36

       Yeah.

   23. NKNikhil Kamath15:36

       It's the lighting. [laughing]

   24. VSVijay Subramaniam15:37

       It's the lighting. [laughing]

   25. SSSajith Sivanandan15:39

       No, but you know what struck me, by the way? I, I, I, I should have started with that. You know, I'm the only person on this table who's not an entrepreneur. The three of you-

   26. VSVijay Subramaniam15:48

       Mm.

   27. SSSajith Sivanandan15:49

       -are doing what I think is the highest calling of mankind-

   28. VSVijay Subramaniam15:52

       Mm.

   29. SSSajith Sivanandan15:52

       -you know, which is like, if you're an entrepreneur... No, no, I-

   30. VSVijay Subramaniam15:55

       You-
6. 23:14 – 26:08

   Influence of Glamour on Decision Making

   1. SSSajith Sivanandan23:14

      piece of this, this thing, right? So-

   2. ABAjay Bijli23:15

      You've been with Hotstar for how long now?

   3. SSSajith Sivanandan23:17

      Just 10 months.

   4. ABAjay Bijli23:18

      10 months, okay.

   5. SSSajith Sivanandan23:18

      10 months.

   6. ABAjay Bijli23:19

      Okay.

   7. SSSajith Sivanandan23:19

      But, A, it feels longer [laughing] as you get there.

   8. NKNikhil Kamath23:21

      When Sajith joined Hotstar, right-

   9. SSSajith Sivanandan23:23

      Yeah

   10. NKNikhil Kamath23:23

       ... and he had to move to Bombay, we were catching up one night for dinner.

   11. SSSajith Sivanandan23:27

       Huh.

   12. NKNikhil Kamath23:28

       And I was asking him like, "You're entering this new world, like, you know, like glamorous world and all of that."

   13. SSSajith Sivanandan23:32

       Mm.

   14. NKNikhil Kamath23:33

       He's like, "Bro-

   15. ABAjay Bijli23:34

       [laughing]

   16. NKNikhil Kamath23:35

       ... I'm gonna stay so far away from all that. I'm gonna go there Monday to Thursday and try to be back home in Bangalore on Friday." [chuckles] And-

   17. SSSajith Sivanandan23:42

       But mind you, there have been quite a few weekends I've done in Mumbai.

   18. NKNikhil Kamath23:44

       Yeah.

   19. SSSajith Sivanandan23:45

       Fantastic place.

   20. ABAjay Bijli23:45

       You know I love the-

   21. NKNikhil Kamath23:46

       Has your, has your mindset about Bollywood changed?

   22. SSSajith Sivanandan23:50

       No, I, I respect-

   23. NKNikhil Kamath23:51

       Mm

   24. SSSajith Sivanandan23:51

       ... you know, uh, look, these are artists. It's hard to be an artist. [laughing]

   25. ABAjay Bijli23:55

       [laughing]

   26. NKNikhil Kamath23:55

       [laughing]

   27. SSSajith Sivanandan23:55

       It's very hard to be an artist, just to be clear.

   28. ABAjay Bijli23:58

       Got it.

   29. SSSajith Sivanandan23:59

       But, I'm not sure... I, I think, I think there are people, pe- like Vijay, Ajay, colleagues of mine who run content, I, I think, I think they know, and they've been in this for a while, to work with and handle all of them.

   30. NKNikhil Kamath24:17

       Mm.
7. 26:08 – 31:56

   Evolving Landscape: The History of Celebrity Agents

   1. VSVijay Subramaniam26:08

      I think the entire business in, from an India POV is just so new. What I mean by saying is the concept of outside in, right? Where to not be a part of the system, to actually create impact in the system is a very, very new concept, and let me, let me actually flesh that out for you a little bit. I don't think you had a... The studios came in, right, back in the day. Before that, the mark- the production- the way production used to work was not really corporatized, right? I mean, it was, it was a little Wild Wild West in that sense, right? Uh, then there was the entire satellite boom that happened. Then now streamers have come in. I think every part, you, since you mentioned evolution, the front end of the ecosystem has consistently evolved over the last couple of decades, over a period of time. The back end of the ecosystem has also now continuously evolved over a period of time. You know, there was- the concept of agents really didn't exist in 2000 even, right? It was basically an age-old family secretary writing dates, uh-

   2. ABAjay Bijli27:16

      Oh, wow! Is that right?

   3. VSVijay Subramaniam27:17

      Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

   4. ABAjay Bijli27:18

      Wow.

   5. VSVijay Subramaniam27:18

      It was, it was not... I mean, there was no emailing a date, or there was no contract. You know, it was very, very clearly, very dealt very directly. I think, to their credit, I think Shailender and Harinder at Percept were the first real godfathers of that business, and that's why I spoke about Mark, because when Mark did those lovely deals with, you know, Sachin and WorldTel at that point in time-

   6. ABAjay Bijli27:39

      Mm

   7. VSVijay Subramaniam27:39

      ... that was the real starting of the Jerry Maguire journey of the business, right? Mark was probably India's first real agent-

   8. ABAjay Bijli27:47

      Mark what?

   9. VSVijay Subramaniam27:47

      Masculine.

   10. ABAjay Bijli27:48

       Masculine, yes.

   11. VSVijay Subramaniam27:48

       And I remember-

   12. ABAjay Bijli27:49

       Mm

   13. VSVijay Subramaniam27:50

       ... when he passed away, God bless him, there was this star-studded, [sighs] uh, funeral kind of thing happening in his, in his house, and we shared a compound wall, right? And everyone had come, from Ravi Shastri to Sachin, to all of that, right? And I remember that Ravi Shastri had won... If you'll remember this, he had won the Benson and Hedges Man of the Series.

   14. ABAjay Bijli28:11

       Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Audi-

   15. VSVijay Subramaniam28:12

       He had this-

   16. ABAjay Bijli28:12

       Mm, yes

   17. VSVijay Subramaniam28:13

       ... parked right outside Mark's house. And I was looking at the Audi saying, "Yeah, " you know, literally. But I think Mark started it, and then slowly we started getting involved, and we started, uh, we started having more and more look into, you know, how can, how can one do this in a slightly more streamlined and organized way? To your question of, of budgets, you know, for whatever comes in and out, I think the studio system brought in some degree of discipline in terms of the way budget works, in terms of the way film works. Today, of course, we are again living in, which I'm pretty certain we will loop to at some point in time, we're again living in slightly dystopic times when it comes to the overall s- uh, commerce of talent. The marriage between platform, and both of you guys are platforms in a way, right? Marriage between commerce, platform, and talent has to find the next level of evolution. I mean, this happened back in the day in CAA when... Uh, when back in the day when in the West, when actors started participating in gross profit points, was, you know, back in the day, and, you know, that made such a huge impact-

   18. ABAjay Bijli29:16

       Mm

   19. VSVijay Subramaniam29:16

       ... to a business. I mean, for the sake of reading, everybody must- you know, there's a book called Powerhouse, which is the story of CAA, where you talk about the greatest films that would not have gotten made if the economic structure of, of conversations didn't change. Forrest Gump being one of it.

   20. ABAjay Bijli29:32

       Mm.

   21. VSVijay Subramaniam29:32

       It, Forrest Gump was in scripting, I think, for nine and a half years.

   22. ABAjay Bijli29:35

       Wow!

   23. VSVijay Subramaniam29:35

       Never got made. It was in, in the cans. And, you know, Top Gun or, uh, Jerry Maguire, you look at all of these films. The history of these films were, at some point in time, the industry in itself took a view on changing the way commerce worked.

   24. ABAjay Bijli29:51

       Mm.

   25. VSVijay Subramaniam29:52

       That was a triangulation between exhibition, product, uh, production, and talent. That's when- that was literally the point at which the triangulation at where the, the business metamorphosized.

   26. NKNikhil Kamath30:05

       I think this is a good segue to kind of describe what we're trying to do today. Uh, content, I think, is a huge industry. Uh, all three of you are super relevant in this, probably the most relevant in India today.... and we want this session to be everything content from a perspective that any entrepreneur trying to build a business in this industry should be able to look at this video, this show, as a reference point, what direction to go in.

   27. VSVijay Subramaniam30:39

       Mm-hmm.

   28. NKNikhil Kamath30:39

       So I had a few topics in mind. I thought, first, we will define what is content. We will get rid of evolution of content, because I just thought about it now, I don't think it helps anyone starting a business today.

   29. VSVijay Subramaniam30:51

       Mm.

   30. NKNikhil Kamath30:51

       So the TV, VCR, all of that-
8. 31:56 – 34:47

   Market Size of OTT, TV & Studios

   1. NKNikhil Kamath31:56

      size first.

   2. VSVijay Subramaniam31:57

      Okay. [chuckles]

   3. NKNikhil Kamath31:59

      So I looked at the streaming numbers, the OTT numbers of different platforms, and how much different platforms charge. Can you just, like, tell me, like, Hotstar is how much, and the number of the average that a user is paying?

   4. SSSajith Sivanandan32:14

      See, but now by that, this time I'm, like, essentially giving you the Hotstar revenue, right? [laughing]

   5. VSVijay Subramaniam32:18

      [laughing]

   6. NKNikhil Kamath32:18

      [laughing]

   7. SSSajith Sivanandan32:18

      I think the way, the, the, the way, uh [laughing] the way you wanna, the way you wanna do this, [chuckles] the way you wanna do this is... Look, there's a BCG meta report, [laughing] right? That says that the streaming subscription kind of business in India is about 2 billion.

   8. NKNikhil Kamath32:36

      Together?

   9. SSSajith Sivanandan32:37

      All players, all-in, ads plus-

   10. NKNikhil Kamath32:38

       So the biggest players are?

   11. SSSajith Sivanandan32:40

       Us, Netflix-

   12. NKNikhil Kamath32:42

       You're followed by Netflix?

   13. VSVijay Subramaniam32:43

       No, I think Hotstar is the biggest, yeah.

   14. SSSajith Sivanandan32:45

       We are, we, we are the largest-

   15. VSVijay Subramaniam32:47

       By country, might be

   16. SSSajith Sivanandan32:47

       ... but, uh, after us it will be Netflix, I think it'll be there. Uh, not in terms of number of subscribers, but I think because their ARPU's are much higher.

   17. NKNikhil Kamath32:55

       Mm-hmm.

   18. SSSajith Sivanandan32:56

       Uh, they have about 8 to 10 million. So there's us, then there's Amazon Prime, SonyLIV. I think these four are the main players. Now, Jio is clearly in the mix, and they will grow, um, and are growing.

   19. NKNikhil Kamath33:09

       So 2 billion is the combin-

   20. SSSajith Sivanandan33:10

       There are about 48. Depending on which source you believe in, there are about 48 to 50 streaming players in India.

   21. NKNikhil Kamath33:16

       So this 2 billion number is the combination of advertising-

   22. SSSajith Sivanandan33:20

       Subscription plus ads

   23. NKNikhil Kamath33:20

       ... everything?

   24. SSSajith Sivanandan33:21

       Yeah. But in that same report-

   25. NKNikhil Kamath33:23

       Mm

   26. SSSajith Sivanandan33:23

       ... interestingly, they say that the kind of video, media, business, so that, that actually includes-

   27. VSVijay Subramaniam33:29

       Social media in India.

   28. SSSajith Sivanandan33:31

       No, no, it doesn't include social media. Includes television, includes streaming, includes movie studios, is... 2022 was about $12 to $14 billion dollars in India.

   29. NKNikhil Kamath33:43

       $12 to $14 billion-

   30. SSSajith Sivanandan33:44

       Yeah
9. 34:47 – 39:59

   OTT vs. TV: Is there a comparison?

   1. NKNikhil Kamath34:47

      Netflix's component is 2 out of 14, right?

   2. VSVijay Subramaniam34:50

      Yeah.

   3. SSSajith Sivanandan34:50

      Very much so. Yeah, very much so. It was there... You see, India has historically been a television-

   4. NKNikhil Kamath34:55

      Mm

   5. SSSajith Sivanandan34:55

      ... market.

   6. NKNikhil Kamath34:56

      I read somewhere that there are some 600 million TV sets in India.

   7. VSVijay Subramaniam34:59

      107-

   8. NKNikhil Kamath34:59

      The access to TV sets is for 600 million people.

   9. SSSajith Sivanandan35:02

      The reach of TV, because you have to include free dish as well, right?

   10. VSVijay Subramaniam35:05

       Mm.

   11. SSSajith Sivanandan35:05

       Like, the-

   12. VSVijay Subramaniam35:06

       Yeah, definitely

   13. SSSajith Sivanandan35:06

       ... the reach of TV is about 800 million people. 800 million people, at some point in time during the year, are watching.

   14. VSVijay Subramaniam35:13

       So just from my understanding, if you guys are at 40, and you're the largest, sum total of all the other aggregators would be around another 60, 70?

   15. SSSajith Sivanandan35:22

       So there are about-

   16. VSVijay Subramaniam35:23

       Just on SWOT, not only-

   17. SSSajith Sivanandan35:24

       Yeah, the size of the number of people who've, uh, who've paid subscription at least once, at any given point in time, is anywhere between 80 to 90 million people.

   18. VSVijay Subramaniam35:33

       Just look at that. So if you're talking 80 to 90 million, and 800 million-

   19. NKNikhil Kamath35:37

       Mm

   20. VSVijay Subramaniam35:37

       ... on TV, there are two ways, I guess, to look at this data. One is, how small the actual OTT business is in absolute terms. The second part which goes- which is, I guess at some point in time, segue, is the opportunity that's sitting ahead of us if the creator and platform game becomes-

   21. NKNikhil Kamath35:56

       Mm

   22. VSVijay Subramaniam35:57

       ... synergistic. You're talking about close to a billion people. I don't know if there's any... I don't know if there's a continent across-

   23. SSSajith Sivanandan36:04

       [chuckles]

   24. VSVijay Subramaniam36:04

       ... a continent across the world where that you have that s- that growth side of the thing.

   25. NKNikhil Kamath36:07

       But I, I don't think that's a fair extrapolation-

   26. VSVijay Subramaniam36:09

       Is it?

   27. NKNikhil Kamath36:09

       ... because the ARPU, ARPUs are completely different.

   28. VSVijay Subramaniam36:11

       Yeah, yeah.

   29. NKNikhil Kamath36:12

       If I had one-

   30. VSVijay Subramaniam36:12

       I'm saying I'm putting AWOT in it as well
10. 39:59 – 44:05

    How does India watch Content?

    1. SSSajith Sivanandan39:59

       take that 40 million down to- That's- Wait, how, how, how are you going to funnel that down the pyramid? What do you need? Is it more content driven? Yeah. Is it more- Yeah. Is it economies? What is it? So, no, it's a great, uh, it's, it's, it's, it's a great, uh, thing to talk about. Uh, and mind you, it's not 40 million, right? Like, so there's about, depending on what source you believe, let's just say there are about 80 million people in this ecosystem. No, I'm talking about... Okay, okay. No, uh, we should talk about the- Right ... ecosystem. So it's about 80 million people who pay a subscription, right? See, one of the most important things that need to happen is more vernacular, more regional, uh, content. That is super key, because increasingly we are seeing that, um, uh, a lot of the content getting consumed, consumed is in vernacular languages, so that's gonna be very, very key. The other thing is, you know, what I wonder is, historically, all these platforms that we're talking about is known for long-form content. Yeah. Very, very- Mm ... well-built, et cetera. Why aren't we thinking about short-form, right? Yeah. Like, you know, stuff that's anywhere between 30 seconds to two minutes, maybe, maybe slightly longer, but 30 min- 30 seconds to two minutes. And, you know, the interesting thing is, uh, studies show, I think this was a Bain study or something, consumers of short-form content are overwhelmingly male. As much as 75% are male, are 25 years and less, and by the way, majority of them come from Tier 2 cities. Yeah. And the high majority, I'm talking 65, 70%- Mm-hmm ... come from Tier 2, uh, cities and below. That's, that's the demo- the demographic there, right? And so if you think of it, there are a couple of things at play here. One, uh, interestingly, um, smartphones- Yeah ... in India, they tend to get set up, in a majority of the cases, as much as two out of three smartphones tend to get set up by the male in the house, and- Even though a woman is buying the smartphone? [chuckles] The point is that women, uh, are not... Look, I'm not talking about Tier 1 cities. Look, now we're thinking pan-India. Yeah. Right? And you really wanna- Yeah ... build out the market and everything. I think just making sure that access to smartphones is more democratized, and so all of that, I think, plays out over a period of time, just in terms of-... price of the smartphone and et cetera.

    2. NKNikhil Kamath42:25

       And does that gender change when the content becomes longer, the gender ratio, seventy-five, twenty-five?

    3. SSSajith Sivanandan42:31

       Not, not, it doesn't reverse or anything, but yes, it, it, it sort of starts to, uh, you know-

    4. NKNikhil Kamath42:37

       So women are consuming longer form content-

    5. SSSajith Sivanandan42:39

       Yes

    6. NKNikhil Kamath42:39

       ... than males?

    7. SSSajith Sivanandan42:40

       Yeah.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath42:41

       Is that only in tier two, three, or also in tier one?

    9. SSSajith Sivanandan42:43

       No, this is majority I'm talking about is tier two and below. But you have to keep one thing in mind, though. The, the main reason that it's also males is because the access to the smartphone is with the males, and what they do is, what they believe is that, uh, their, their wives or whoever, the women in the family, that they get access to television is like a sacrifice that the male is making.

    10. NKNikhil Kamath43:04

        Mm.

    11. SSSajith Sivanandan43:04

        And so, so they, they-

    12. NKNikhil Kamath43:06

        That's very cultural. [laughing]

    13. ABAjay Bijli43:08

        Very cultural.

    14. NKNikhil Kamath43:08

        Actually-

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan43:08

        Cultural, right?

    16. ABAjay Bijli43:09

        Yeah.

    17. SSSajith Sivanandan43:09

        So no, but, uh... so but that, this has profound implications for anybody wanting to get into business, right? Well, who are you building for? Um, what can we do to get actually more women consuming more of this content on devices that are actually, that belong to them, right? And, and once that starts to unlock, that's, to your point, Vijay, that is when you truly democratize. Like, that's where you really... This eighty million becomes much bigger.

    18. ABAjay Bijli43:37

        Yeah.

    19. NKNikhil Kamath43:37

        Just to summarize-

    20. SSSajith Sivanandan43:38

        Yeah

    21. NKNikhil Kamath43:38

        ... you said two billion OTT purely.

    22. SSSajith Sivanandan43:41

        Yeah.

    23. NKNikhil Kamath43:42

        Eight billion TV, TV related.

    24. SSSajith Sivanandan43:44

        Yeah, eight to ten billion, yeah.

    25. NKNikhil Kamath43:46

        Yeah.

    26. SSSajith Sivanandan43:46

        I'll get you the exact numbers.

    27. NKNikhil Kamath43:47

        OTT growing approximately twenty, thirty percent.

    28. SSSajith Sivanandan43:50

        Yeah.

    29. NKNikhil Kamath43:50

        TV growing at a lower rate than that.

    30. SSSajith Sivanandan43:53

        De-
11. 44:05 – 47:04

    Dive into Cinema: Multiplex vs. Single-Screen

    1. NKNikhil Kamath44:05

       between single screens and multiplexes? Uh, demographically, like he said, how many male, how many women? Uh, what is happening in the north of India? What's happening in the south of India?

    2. ABAjay Bijli44:19

       [laughing] Um, nine thousand screens. Uh, number keeps changing because a lot of screens close down as well.

    3. NKNikhil Kamath44:28

       Mm-hmm.

    4. ABAjay Bijli44:29

       Um, and they close down for, uh, uh, reasons which are more to do with building bylaws. Sometimes the cinema is still doing well-

    5. NKNikhil Kamath44:37

       Explain that.

    6. ABAjay Bijli44:38

       Uh, but the real estate value-

    7. NKNikhil Kamath44:40

       Uh

    8. ABAjay Bijli44:40

       ... of a mom-and-pop cinema owner is much more, uh, the potential is much more than running it as a single screen only, of thousand seats. So government allowed a lot of, uh, uh, every single sing- uh, cinema owner to convert it into a three hundred seater cinema only, and the rest into commercial. So because so fragmented, India never had chains.

    9. NKNikhil Kamath45:02

       Mm.

    10. ABAjay Bijli45:02

        If there were ten thousand cinemas, they were- they belong to ten thousand owners. So they found that they could get better value if they converted. So in fact, which is, which is not very good for the industry-

    11. NKNikhil Kamath45:12

        Mm

    12. ABAjay Bijli45:12

        ... but, uh, that's one reason why about five hundred odd screens, uh, start, uh, close every year. We o- we open, when I say multiplex association, multiplexes open about three hundred screens. So net-net, about nine thousand screens are total, uh, in India. Uh, multiplexes will be about three thousand five hundred.

    13. NKNikhil Kamath45:29

        Mm.

    14. ABAjay Bijli45:30

        And, uh, single screen penetration is a hell of a lot in south still. Again, because of the malls and shopping... Bangalore is an exception.

    15. NKNikhil Kamath45:38

        Mm.

    16. ABAjay Bijli45:38

        Bangalore, we just opened our two hundredth screen.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath45:40

        Ah. [laughing]

    18. ABAjay Bijli45:40

        And because, uh, everywhere, malls are coming up like crazy.

    19. NKNikhil Kamath45:44

        Right.

    20. ABAjay Bijli45:44

        But overall, um, you know, you have less penetration of multiplex screens. Uh, also-

    21. NKNikhil Kamath45:50

        So you said in nine thousand, thousand five hundred are multiplex?

    22. ABAjay Bijli45:52

        No, three thousand five hundred.

    23. NKNikhil Kamath45:53

        Three thousand five hundred.

    24. ABAjay Bijli45:53

        Three thousand five hundred. And-

    25. NKNikhil Kamath45:55

        And what was the number five years ago, single screen, multiplex?

    26. ABAjay Bijli45:58

        Uh, m- because five years ago, so you can minus fifteen hundred. So about two thousand, uh, multiplexes were there.

    27. NKNikhil Kamath46:04

        But the total number of screens are not going up-

    28. ABAjay Bijli46:06

        Roughly

    29. NKNikhil Kamath46:06

        ... you're saying the share of multiplex is going up.

    30. ABAjay Bijli46:09

        Is, uh, share, percentage share. So box office-wise, seventy percent of the revenues-
12. 47:04 – 49:04

    Regional Diversity in Cinema

    1. NKNikhil Kamath47:04

       theaters, things like, uh, compliance and regulation? Like you need to have a fire escape and this and that. Do they add to the cost of-

    2. ABAjay Bijli47:12

       They add, add to the CapEx.

    3. NKNikhil Kamath47:13

       Is that the main reason?

    4. ABAjay Bijli47:15

       Uh, a-and, and not getting the right locations and destinations where you can convert them into... Plus, cannibalization happens very quickly because these smaller towns have also got very small population.

    5. NKNikhil Kamath47:24

       Mm.

    6. ABAjay Bijli47:25

       So you make one multiplex, two multiplex, three multiplexes, they all do well.

    7. NKNikhil Kamath47:28

       What scale does it make sense to have a multiplex in a town?

    8. ABAjay Bijli47:32

       I think, uh, our smallest city would be like a Latur, where we have-

    9. NKNikhil Kamath47:35

       How many there?

    10. ABAjay Bijli47:35

        ... five hundred thousand people are there, and we still build multiplexes. Again, small price point-

    11. NKNikhil Kamath47:40

        Mm

    12. ABAjay Bijli47:40

        ... um, and, and also the, uh, uh, one, one thing that you asked me about the difference between various, uh, regions. Uh, south, I'm- sorry, I'm clubbing the entire south-

    13. NKNikhil Kamath47:51

        Yeah

    14. ABAjay Bijli47:51

        ... into one category, but Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam-

    15. NKNikhil Kamath47:54

        Mm

    16. ABAjay Bijli47:54

        ... Kannada, Hindi, English, consumes the highest number of, uh, films, uh, in a year, and the movie-going index is also the highest, which is twelve times a year.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath48:05

        Wow!

    18. ABAjay Bijli48:06

        So that's how disparate the market is. Now, the moment you start going towards west, uh, north, east, and central-

    19. NKNikhil Kamath48:12

        Yeah

    20. ABAjay Bijli48:13

        ... only two languages.

    21. NKNikhil Kamath48:14

        Yeah.

    22. ABAjay Bijli48:14

        English, also dubbed English, like you said-

    23. NKNikhil Kamath48:16

        Yeah

    24. ABAjay Bijli48:17

        ... escapism, Fast and Furious, Marvel, DC, or Hindi, or-

    25. NKNikhil Kamath48:20

        I actually have this number. It says sixty-two percent of single screen theaters are in the south.

    26. ABAjay Bijli48:26

        Correct. Right. [laughing]

    27. NKNikhil Kamath48:27

        Sixty-two percent.

    28. ABAjay Bijli48:28

        Yeah.

    29. NKNikhil Kamath48:28

        Followed by sixteen percent in the north.

    30. ABAjay Bijli48:30

        That's right, yeah.
13. 49:04 – 50:48

    Insights into Gender Behaviour & Demographics

    1. ABAjay Bijli49:04

       I don't know-

    2. NKNikhil Kamath49:05

       Mm.

    3. ABAjay Bijli49:05

       - but age-wise, it's twelve to thirty-four.

    4. NKNikhil Kamath49:07

       Would you say it's similar, like movie going out audience, seventy-five men, twenty-five women?

    5. ABAjay Bijli49:13

       All I know is women take a, a decision based on how good the toilets are, [laughing] where, where should the, the family go?

    6. NKNikhil Kamath49:22

       Right.

    7. ABAjay Bijli49:22

       So we, we, uh, we did a lot of study, and we realized that, uh, women of the house takes a decision which cinema to go to, whether it's your daughter, your wife, or your mother, or your girlfriend.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath49:31

       How, how do you measure that, though?

    9. ABAjay Bijli49:33

       We just, uh, uh-

    10. NKNikhil Kamath49:35

        Sorry

    11. ABAjay Bijli49:35

        ... got this huge feedback from our own, uh, uh, you know, loyalty program-

    12. NKNikhil Kamath49:39

        Mm

    13. ABAjay Bijli49:40

        ... uh, that, uh, uh, you know, the colors that we use, uh, the, the, the way the lo- toilets, the hygiene level, everything.

    14. SPSpeaker49:46

        Wow!

    15. NKNikhil Kamath49:47

        Like, what color is appealing and what isn't?

    16. ABAjay Bijli49:49

        It's gotta be... Look, our, our movies are larger than life, colorful.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath49:53

        Mm. Mm.

    18. ABAjay Bijli49:53

        And if you remember, 1990s, the cinemas all used to be gray.

    19. NKNikhil Kamath49:56

        Correct.

    20. ABAjay Bijli49:56

        So therefore, you know, at the cost of sometimes it looking, uh, uh, you know, a little loud, we really try to make sure the teals and the pinks and the magentas and the blues are using, uh, being used. It doesn't happen in the West.

    21. NKNikhil Kamath50:10

        Mm.

    22. ABAjay Bijli50:10

        But in the West, it's like you come, buy a, buy a ticket, buy a popcorn, Pepsi, watch the movie, and get out.

    23. NKNikhil Kamath50:16

        Mm.

    24. ABAjay Bijli50:16

        So I call them shoebox cinemas.

    25. NKNikhil Kamath50:18

        Right.

    26. ABAjay Bijli50:18

        Whereas in India, it's a, it's a form of an entertainment. People, you know, they dress up, they come, uh-

    27. SPSpeaker50:24

        It's an event.

    28. ABAjay Bijli50:24

        It's an event, and there's an interval, so you again come back to the foyer.

    29. SPSpeaker50:28

        That's what I'm saying, yeah.

    30. ABAjay Bijli50:28

        You, when, when you go to the loo, you think that you're also the hero.
14. 50:48 – 54:27

    Revenue Tango: Producers & Multiplex

    1. ABAjay Bijli50:48

       percent tickets.

    2. NKNikhil Kamath50:49

       I've always wondered, if I pay two hundred rupees to PVR for a ticket-

    3. ABAjay Bijli50:53

       Yeah

    4. NKNikhil Kamath50:53

       ... how much goes back to the person who made the movie, and how much does PVR keep?

    5. ABAjay Bijli50:57

       Fifty percent. Roughly fifty.

    6. NKNikhil Kamath50:59

       Is that negotiable? Like, if it's a Shah Rukh Khan movie, would you keep forty? And if it's-

    7. ABAjay Bijli51:03

       So it's a, it's a sliding scale. First week is fifty, and then if the movie reaches a certain, uh, threshold of, uh, box office, then you get a two point five percent bonus to the producer. And if it doesn't, then there's a two point five percent discount, because there are so many movies.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath51:19

       And when you say two point five percent-

    9. ABAjay Bijli51:20

       It becomes forty-seven point five percent.

    10. NKNikhil Kamath51:22

        Right.

    11. ABAjay Bijli51:22

        So in, in, in the producer's favor... Uh, sorry, our favor, we get fifty-two point five, producer will get forty-seven point five, and the other way around, if the movie reaches a certain threshold, uh, occupancy and numbers-

    12. NKNikhil Kamath51:33

        Do you-

    13. ABAjay Bijli51:33

        ... then next week it goes to thirty-seven point five, and then it goes to about thirty percent.

    14. NKNikhil Kamath51:37

        Do you also have a revenue stream where people offer you money for more screens than they would have gotten democratic?

    15. ABAjay Bijli51:44

        No.

    16. NKNikhil Kamath51:46

        No.

    17. ABAjay Bijli51:46

        That used to happen earlier.

    18. NKNikhil Kamath51:47

        Uh.

    19. ABAjay Bijli51:47

        What they used to call minimum guarantee or theater hire.

    20. NKNikhil Kamath51:51

        Mm.

    21. ABAjay Bijli51:51

        Uh, that doesn't happen anymore. Now, you just release the movie. Whatever the box office collections are, you split it on a weekly basis. That's it.

    22. NKNikhil Kamath51:59

        So what would you say, Ajay, is the total revenue, like he said, two billion OTT, eight to nine billion television?

    23. SPSpeaker52:06

        Yeah.

    24. NKNikhil Kamath52:07

        In these nine thousand screens, three and a half thousand multiplex, and the balance-

    25. SPSpeaker52:12

        Yeah

    26. NKNikhil Kamath52:12

        ... six thousand, uh, single th- theater, all the tickets sold, all the food sold in that ratio, sixty, twenty-five-

    27. SPSpeaker52:20

        Yeah

    28. NKNikhil Kamath52:20

        ... ten in advertising in between movies or whatever, combination of all those elements, what would be the revenue?

    29. ABAjay Bijli52:27

        Uh, box office is what is reported mainly.

    30. SPSpeaker52:29

        Yeah.
15. 54:27 – 1:00:34

    Do OTTs Pose a Challenge to Multiplexes?

    1. ABAjay Bijli54:27

       blurred in the, uh, you know, oh, pandemic-

    2. NKNikhil Kamath54:30

       Mm

    3. ABAjay Bijli54:30

       ... where because producers could not release the movies on the big screen-

    4. NKNikhil Kamath54:34

       Mm

    5. ABAjay Bijli54:34

       ... uh, therefore, you know, and cinemas were shut anyway.... and they want to monetize their content. A lot of content got sold, and now, uh, basically, uh, there is some amount which is purely OTT revenue and which is, uh, the TV shows or fa- fabulous TV shows, and some is, um, going through that monetization journey of content anyway.

    6. NKNikhil Kamath54:56

       Mm.

    7. ABAjay Bijli54:57

       Which is first it goes to theatrical-

    8. NKNikhil Kamath54:58

       Which is right.

    9. ABAjay Bijli54:59

       The quantitative and the qualitative benchmark gets set, then goes to OTT, then goes to, uh, satellite.

    10. NKNikhil Kamath55:05

        Yeah.

    11. ABAjay Bijli55:05

        So that part, I don't know the exact number.

    12. NKNikhil Kamath55:07

        I, I read this very interesting... The paper spoke about the theatrical window.

    13. ABAjay Bijli55:14

        Yeah.

    14. NKNikhil Kamath55:14

        So let's say 10 years ago or five years ago, the difference in time from when a movie released in a theater-

    15. ABAjay Bijli55:21

        Right

    16. NKNikhil Kamath55:21

        ... to when it came out on OTT, or you can extrapolate and say VCD, DVD-

    17. ABAjay Bijli55:25

        Yeah, yeah. Correct

    18. NKNikhil Kamath55:26

        ... Blu-ray, whatever.

    19. ABAjay Bijli55:27

        Correct.

    20. NKNikhil Kamath55:27

        Used to be a couple of years, came down to one year, came down to six months, came down to one month. There have been experiments where they both released on the same day.

    21. ABAjay Bijli55:38

        Yeah.

    22. NKNikhil Kamath55:38

        The movie actually did well, but the theater community had such an issue with it-

    23. ABAjay Bijli55:43

        Yes

    24. NKNikhil Kamath55:43

        ... that they were not allowed to release on the same day.

    25. ABAjay Bijli55:45

        Correct, correct.

    26. NKNikhil Kamath55:46

        Do you think the fact that a movie is re- is re- is releasing in a theater first helps OTT?

    27. ABAjay Bijli55:54

        I think both, uh, uh, well, this is what is-

    28. NKNikhil Kamath55:57

        This is marketing for the movie.

    29. ABAjay Bijli55:58

        Yeah. This is what... Absolutely. So, uh, this happened during the pandemic, obviously. Uh, the, the windows collapsed completely, as I said, for the same reason, because studios had content ready, and they wanted to release it, and obviously lots of studios came out with their own streaming services.

    30. NKNikhil Kamath56:13

        Right.
16. 1:00:34 – 1:01:56

    Reviving Theatrical Magic Post COVlD

    1. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:34

       but so long as they're all sort of lifting-

    2. NKNikhil Kamath1:00:36

       Yeah

    3. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:36

       ... actually, it's a much healthier, you know, industry that way.

    4. NKNikhil Kamath1:00:38

       I so agree with you, because I don't think the question is-... OTT-

    5. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:42

       Correct

    6. NKNikhil Kamath1:00:42

       - or theaters?

    7. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:43

       No, it should not be.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath1:00:44

       I think it is-

    9. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:45

       Life is not binary. Yeah.

    10. NKNikhil Kamath1:00:46

        What combination of OTT and theater together can aid this ecosystem-

    11. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:51

        Yeah

    12. NKNikhil Kamath1:00:51

        ... which at the end of the day, is employing so many people-

    13. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:53

        Absolutely

    14. NKNikhil Kamath1:00:53

        ... to do better?

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan1:00:54

        Exactly.

    16. ABAjay Bijli1:00:55

        In fact, during the, during COVID, a lot of people thought we'll panic, and I'll object to movies going to the big screen. I was actually very happy, because at least money is flowing back into the production fraternity. I had a very contrarian view.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath1:01:06

        Yeah.

    18. ABAjay Bijli1:01:06

        Because imagine if they- these... Because it's a very fragmented market-

    19. NKNikhil Kamath1:01:10

        Yeah

    20. ABAjay Bijli1:01:10

        ... studios were having a problem.

    21. SSSajith Sivanandan1:01:11

        Yeah.

    22. ABAjay Bijli1:01:11

        Imagine here, mom and pop-

    23. SSSajith Sivanandan1:01:13

        Yeah, yeah

    24. ABAjay Bijli1:01:13

        ... you know, 5,000, 6,000 producers who made a movie, and they can't release it. So in fact, it's a very healthy thing-

    25. NKNikhil Kamath1:01:19

        Yeah

    26. ABAjay Bijli1:01:19

        ... that they were able to monetize their content by selling it to-

    27. SSSajith Sivanandan1:01:22

        That's right

    28. ABAjay Bijli1:01:22

        ... uh, various, uh-

    29. SSSajith Sivanandan1:01:24

        Yeah

    30. ABAjay Bijli1:01:24

        ... streaming platforms.
17. 1:01:56 – 1:04:31

    Sports Streaming in India

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:01:56

       and during the Football World Cup, people were just sitting in front of a screen and watching the Football World Cup.

    2. ABAjay Bijli1:02:03

       Sure.

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:02:03

       And they had these sport zones, they would call it.

    4. ABAjay Bijli1:02:05

       Sure.

    5. NKNikhil Kamath1:02:06

       When there is something to be said about watching sport with 100 people or 200 people-

    6. SSSajith Sivanandan1:02:13

       Yeah, communal

    7. NKNikhil Kamath1:02:13

       ... which is, which is a very communal energy aspect.

    8. SSSajith Sivanandan1:02:15

       Communal.

    9. ABAjay Bijli1:02:16

       Sponsored.

    10. NKNikhil Kamath1:02:16

        So-

    11. ABAjay Bijli1:02:17

        Yeah

    12. NKNikhil Kamath1:02:17

        ... sport right now, for somebody like a streaming platform, how big is it in terms of revenue share? And then I'm gonna go to Ajay and ask him: Do you think there is a serious play for theaters in sport? Mm.

    13. SSSajith Sivanandan1:02:30

        Yeah. I... You know, sports is very, very critical to our portfolio. Sports essentially is like, it just creates top of the funnel.

    14. NKNikhil Kamath1:02:39

        Mm.

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan1:02:40

        Um, a very, very large top of the funnel, and that's the strategy Jio are doing. We've been doing it for, for a while now. I think we were the ones who- that started it, frankly.

    16. NKNikhil Kamath1:02:50

        But I'm trying to arrive at the number of, in this $2 billion in OTT, what is cricket's market share?

    17. SSSajith Sivanandan1:02:56

        Earlier, it, it was a significant share of the subscription market, because the last three years-

    18. NKNikhil Kamath1:03:02

        Mm

    19. SSSajith Sivanandan1:03:03

        ... we put it behind the paywall. And so if you had to watch the IPL or the World Cup, you had to pay to be a subscriber. We have three-month plans that allow you to do that, for example. But now we're, we're pivoting. Jio's gonna come in as well. So you have to look at it more from kind of maybe the ads revenue it drives-

    20. NKNikhil Kamath1:03:24

        Yeah

    21. SSSajith Sivanandan1:03:24

        ... more than it will drive subscription revenue.

    22. NKNikhil Kamath1:03:26

        Right.

    23. SSSajith Sivanandan1:03:26

        Right? And that's the point I was making about it being a fantastic top of the funnel, like-

    24. NKNikhil Kamath1:03:31

        Right

    25. SSSajith Sivanandan1:03:32

        ... people are just going to want to come-

    26. NKNikhil Kamath1:03:33

        Yeah

    27. SSSajith Sivanandan1:03:35

        ... because it's cricket.

    28. NKNikhil Kamath1:03:35

        Yeah.

    29. SSSajith Sivanandan1:03:36

        And so they get onto the platform in, like, literally hundreds of millions of, in terms of numbers.

    30. NKNikhil Kamath1:03:41

        Mm.
18. 1:04:31 – 1:06:30

    Subscriptions: The Psyche of the Consumer

    1. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:31

       Sure, sure.

    2. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:31

       If we believe the paying audience in India-

    3. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:33

       Mm

    4. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:34

       ... for something like this, let's, let's be very liberal and say 100 million people.

    5. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:39

       Yeah.

    6. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:39

       Okay? I'm, I'm, like, really-

    7. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:41

       I think that's fair.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:41

       I'm stretching it.

    9. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:42

       They'd pay.

    10. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:43

        Uh.

    11. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:43

        Depending on what the price point is, they'd, they'd pay.

    12. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:45

        Yeah. If you were to buy into the school of psychology where people attribute value to price-

    13. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:53

        Right

    14. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:53

        ... like, if you were to give me something for free, my mind would think it is not worth much.

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan1:04:58

        Mm.

    16. NKNikhil Kamath1:04:58

        But if you were to package the same product and charge me a thousand rupees for it, I would suddenly attribute value to it, and I also have a trigger point that I've paid once, so I will stick to the platform for longer. And if we arrive at this 100 million number, and these guys have smartphones and access to that much money-

    17. SSSajith Sivanandan1:05:18

        Yeah

    18. NKNikhil Kamath1:05:18

        ... would it make more sense for a platform to actually put everything behind a paywall and not have anything for free?

    19. SSSajith Sivanandan1:05:25

        No, Nikhil, because, you know, you have to take into account substitution effect. See, the reality is that it's very e- this is not exclusive on one-

    20. NKNikhil Kamath1:05:35

        Mm

    21. SSSajith Sivanandan1:05:36

        ... one platform.

    22. NKNikhil Kamath1:05:36

        Even cricket, when you have the rights?

    23. SSSajith Sivanandan1:05:38

        On television as well. The, the reality is, the presumption-

    24. NKNikhil Kamath1:05:44

        Mm

    25. SSSajith Sivanandan1:05:45

        ... that you, that there would be high value attributed to it, and we'd have a high number to it, just doesn't hold because it's available somewhere else.

    26. NKNikhil Kamath1:05:53

        Mm. Yeah.

    27. SSSajith Sivanandan1:05:54

        Right? I mean...

    28. NKNikhil Kamath1:05:55

        Yeah.

    29. SSSajith Sivanandan1:05:55

        And so that will not work.

    30. NKNikhil Kamath1:05:57

        Yeah, I, I agree.
19. 1:06:30 – 1:08:30

    Future of the Sports-Cinemas Nexus

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:06:30

       movie theaters and cricket, what do you see going forward? Is there an opportunity for someone to build around that?

    2. ABAjay Bijli1:06:35

       Uh, I think, uh, uh, cinemas are meant to show movies only.

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:06:38

       Mm.

    4. ABAjay Bijli1:06:39

       But definitely there are, uh, peaks and valleys-

    5. VSVijay Subramaniam1:06:42

       ... and, uh, when cricket becomes exceedingly more important than movies as well. And the short form of, uh, cricket, I've noticed people don't get restless. Any, any sport, short form, whether it's a football match, like, you know, we showed the World Cup as well. The moment it becomes long form, even, uh, a one-day match is long form, then it- or if there's an exceptional match like India, Pakistan-

    6. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:04

       Mm.

    7. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:04

       -then you can show. But I've noticed people start getting restless.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:07

       Is there, is there room for integration between a Dream11 and a PVR, where you have live fantasy competition in a theater in that confined setting amongst people there?

    9. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:19

       Yeah. If the GST comes down, why not? [laughing]

    10. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:22

        Like, can there be innovative things like that?

    11. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:24

        Of course.

    12. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:24

        Because-

    13. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:25

        We have to, we have to-

    14. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:25

        If you're all agreed on the fact that the community nature of watching sport-

    15. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:29

        Yeah, yeah, yeah

    16. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:29

        ... is invigorating, and it's exciting for people to be in that environment, what can somebody-- how can somebody tweak cricket and theater together to make it more fun?

    17. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:40

        So yeah, we've done that, Nikhil. So that's the closest thing. So, so basically there is a stadium-

    18. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:45

        Mm-hmm

    19. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:45

        ... actually being there, number one way of watching it. Let's say, all the facilities and comforts are there, and going in and going out is easy.

    20. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:52

        Yeah. But I think just because we all agree on that community, right?

    21. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:55

        Yeah.

    22. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:55

        I think there's something there for-

    23. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:57

        Yeah.

    24. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:57

        -theaters-

    25. VSVijay Subramaniam1:07:58

        It's a, it's a next, uh-

    26. NKNikhil Kamath1:07:59

        To use that community aspect with cricket

    27. VSVijay Subramaniam1:08:01

        ... Yeah, it's the next thing to live-

    28. NKNikhil Kamath1:08:03

        Yeah

    29. VSVijay Subramaniam1:08:04

        ... uh, than, you know, watching it at home.

    30. NKNikhil Kamath1:08:06

        So this was incredible that you guys broke down and defined market sizes in the manner that you did. In some ways, OTT, movies, uh, movie theaters, uh, I can even extrapolate to movie producers, directors, uh, uh, people working around movies. All of them are not having

20. 1:08:30 – 1:16:40

    Economics of Talent

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:08:30

       the best time in the world right now in terms of profitability, in terms of institution which are cash flow positive or, like, profitable, net-net profitable. And many people think the problem lies in one place. [laughing] And, [laughing] and let me euphemize what I have to say.

    2. SSSajith Sivanandan1:08:54

       Let's do this. I'm, I'm ready. [laughing] Come on.

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:08:57

       Let me euphemize what I have to say, and say, not entitled, but [laughing] do you... [laughing]

    4. VSVijay Subramaniam1:09:06

       Is that euphemism? [laughing]

    5. NKNikhil Kamath1:09:09

       Do you think if a movie or if content's budget, 50% of it is spent-

    6. SSSajith Sivanandan1:09:19

       On talent?

    7. NKNikhil Kamath1:09:19

       ... servicing, not even talent, but servicing the two or three people amongst a few hundred of the people you can put in the category of talent, do you think something is wrong with the ecosystem?

    8. SSSajith Sivanandan1:09:33

       And-

    9. NKNikhil Kamath1:09:33

       And I'm asking you this-

    10. SSSajith Sivanandan1:09:34

        Vijay, remember, uh, a good business usually makes money, and healthy business, to that point.

    11. NKNikhil Kamath1:09:39

        Yeah. Yeah.

    12. VSVijay Subramaniam1:09:40

        So basically, you're being nice to me all night. [laughing]

    13. SSSajith Sivanandan1:09:43

        You're supplementing that. [laughing]

    14. NKNikhil Kamath1:09:45

        And you manage all these people with really large egos. We are cognizant to the fact that you manage most of them. [laughing] Huh? [laughing]

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan1:09:58

        You're right. Yeah. Um, there's that.

    16. VSVijay Subramaniam1:10:00

        Yeah.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath1:10:01

        Yeah.

    18. VSVijay Subramaniam1:10:01

        No, I think, I think this is a long-standing debate, uh, and I think it's a great conversation to call out the elephant in the room. [chuckles] Uh, everybody's here to make a living, right? Everybody's here to... You're here for part of the $2 billion. Uh, you know, you can choose to charge what you want. Tomorrow, if hypothetically, you have a subscription fee that a consumer who is at a particular socioeconomic class may not think it's, it's a, it's, uh, it's, it's valuable enough, you run what you run, and obviously, you're, you're, you're validated or not by the consumer paying for that, right? I think my business is pretty much the same. There is a... It is a marketplace of a buyer and a seller. Uh, so I think the simple answer to that is, what really are the economics that make it work? So if you don't want to pay on the front end, right? If you say... If you tell a guy that, "I don't want to pay this to you right up front," because, say, it costs, it, it pre-loads the film up front, what are the economics of the back end, right? How is it favorable in the back end? Are studios today willing to work under 50%? Are studios today willing to work by parting IP? Are studios willing to work by changing the economics, where it changes in a way where everybody in the process makes money? Uh, are producers of feature films today are in a position where, uh, budgets can be clean, right, in front of-

    19. NKNikhil Kamath1:11:28

        Mm

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam1:11:29

        ... in front of a performing artist? Are music licenses and royalties being paid out to a co-producer at a, at a certain, at a certain degree of transparency? Uh, how are you evaluating these rights? Uh, do some of the right-- like, digital and satellite rights are diminishing, right? They're not accretive. You're not gonna pay for the second cycle of a film that you bought. You're not gonna pay the same money that you paid for the first cycle of the film that you bought, right? So I think there's a lot that goes at play. I think, yes, are there room for certain corrections in prices? I think it's not very different. I think today, if you're shopping in your world, if you're going to a Flipkart and shopping, and you find a particular product SKU expensive, in a month, they discount the price, right? If that SKU is not selling. Why are the rules of marketplaces different here? Because someone's famous? I don't think that's fair, right? I think that's a very unfair argument because the easiest thing to do is, is to bell the loudest cat, right? But the fact of the matter is, yes, given it could be one or two or handful of people who may be spoiling the economics at scale, by and large, but I don't think that's the rule. We are at a very, very strong precipice in the business, right? Because never before has the business been given an opportunity where artist-... platform, whatever the platform is, it could be a big screen, it could be a small screen, medium screen. Artist, platform, and creator have the opportunity of coming together to deriving a new model, right? I'd like a global multinational studio to tell me that they dropped financing below fifty percent.

    21. SPSpeaker1:13:04

        What is that? Explain.

    22. VSVijay Subramaniam1:13:05

        So typically, when you do a studio deal, uh, the studio back- the financier backs fifty percent of the film and fifty percent stays with the producer, right?

    23. SPSpeaker1:13:14

        So wait, the, are there three entities? Studio, financier-

    24. VSVijay Subramaniam1:13:17

        No, so I'll tell you how. So for example, Nikhil's producing a film. Nikhil's the studio, Ajay sir is the producer, right? Nikhil is paying him to make the film, so you take fifty percent. He-- So he's diluted from his hundred percent to fifty percent of his idea, right? What's there to share?

    25. SPSpeaker1:13:35

        Is that the typical ratio?

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam1:13:36

        That is the typical ratio, right?

    27. SPSpeaker1:13:37

        Mm.

    28. VSVijay Subramaniam1:13:37

        And these guys will back me on this. Now, I'm the actor.

    29. SPSpeaker1:13:39

        Mm.

    30. VSVijay Subramaniam1:13:40

        You're saying, "Okay, you know what? Bring down my fee upfront," but then I'm going to ask you, "Are you going to come clean with your budget?" Right? So for example-
21. 1:16:40 – 1:22:00

    Creators' Crucial Role in the Content Ecosystem

    1. VSVijay Subramaniam1:16:40

       with the creator. All your business models come to nothing if the creator system is not solid.

    2. SSSajith Sivanandan1:16:45

       Mm.

    3. VSVijay Subramaniam1:16:45

       So my question to a platform... Sorry.

    4. SSSajith Sivanandan1:16:48

       But, but that's the thing: Is the creator system, is it solid?

    5. VSVijay Subramaniam1:16:51

       It's not, sir.

    6. SSSajith Sivanandan1:16:52

       No.

    7. VSVijay Subramaniam1:16:52

       But I-- That's exactly what I'm coming and telling you.

    8. SSSajith Sivanandan1:16:54

       Yeah.

    9. VSVijay Subramaniam1:16:54

       What incentivizes me to do, to do, today to become a writer? I'm asking you a very simple question. He just said that ninety percent is working, ten percent is not, Bollywood is not firing. What incentivizes me today to, to become a Bollywood writer?

    10. SPSpeaker1:17:13

        Mm.

    11. VSVijay Subramaniam1:17:14

        Why is the writers strike happening?

    12. SPSpeaker1:17:16

        Mm.

    13. VSVijay Subramaniam1:17:16

        Because in that part of the world, writers are treated with as much reverence as a director or an actor, because he's creating the content.

    14. SSSajith Sivanandan1:17:24

        Sure.

    15. SPSpeaker1:17:25

        Mm.

    16. VSVijay Subramaniam1:17:25

        So my question to you guys as produ- and to not just to you, to the larger producer community, is how do we tell better stories?

    17. SPSpeaker1:17:31

        Mm.

    18. VSVijay Subramaniam1:17:32

        Because when... To your point, sir, you were talking about Kantara, it came from a story.

    19. SPSpeaker1:17:35

        Mm.

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam1:17:36

        You have somebody out here who told you during, during our break that as an audience, it didn't resonate to him because it came from Banga- from his part, from his, from south.

    21. SPSpeaker1:17:46

        It resonated.

    22. VSVijay Subramaniam1:17:46

        Because... No, it resonated because it came from his town.

    23. SPSpeaker1:17:49

        Mm.

    24. VSVijay Subramaniam1:17:50

        So we say in Kannada, we say, "Mannina maga," which means son of the soil. [chuckles] Right? Because better sto- better stories make for better films, better films make for better economies, and hence, it becomes better for actors.

    25. SSSajith Sivanandan1:18:05

        The reality is, though, it seems like stardom is bestowed on the very few. Is there a world where that part would be m- would instead of like a few in the head, there'd be a broader torso?

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam1:18:19

        Like I said, every crisis leads to an opportunity, in my book at least-

    27. SSSajith Sivanandan1:18:23

        Okay.

    28. VSVijay Subramaniam1:18:23

        - and I think most, most of us in this room agree. [coughs] What has the pandemic done? It has effectively redefined a lot of things, right? Today, I represent, my com- the company rather, represents, uh, YouTubers who make as much- who make a lot of money by creating content now.

    29. SSSajith Sivanandan1:18:44

        Sure.

    30. VSVijay Subramaniam1:18:45

        Today-... one of those content creators who are on your platform once-
22. 1:22:00 – 1:38:00

    Should the Movie Business Model change?

    1. VSVijay Subramaniam1:22:00

       you're not giving me a share of it. If you tell me, "Come to the table, here is, here is the cookie, let's split it."

    2. ABAjay Bijli1:22:06

       [chuckles]

    3. VSVijay Subramaniam1:22:06

       You change your model, I change mine. You don't, I charge, and I take, and I'm not going to be guilty about it, because you're not changing yours. Why do you think musicians in India don't make money? For all the Bollywood song and dance we talk about, why do you think they, they are reduced to making money from weddings, corporate shows?

    4. ABAjay Bijli1:22:25

       [chuckles]

    5. VSVijay Subramaniam1:22:26

       Why don't they get music royalty rights? The top ten richest celebrities in the world, seventy percent are musicians. India doesn't have one in the top thousand, I guess.

    6. ABAjay Bijli1:22:37

       Hmm.

    7. VSVijay Subramaniam1:22:37

       Why is that? When the big, fat Indian wedding is the global phenomenon, you don't have, you don't have a single musician there? Because somewhere the system is not allowing, the right system, the IP system in this country, is not allowing the least, the last benefitor, which is the creator, to benefit from it. Hence, why should the creator be holden to a regulated form? On content, the call-out is very simple: don't blame it on the actor fee. For example, in the US, on Ghostbusters, they made money off, off video rights, that's video-on-demand rights, which means whenever they sold VHS, they made money. Will you give me syndication across different countries? When Hotstar opens up in a hundred and sixty countries, will I get money from those countries? When Taaza Khabar plays in two hundred countries, will I get money from those countries? Will I have globe-- Will I share... Will I have a share of the global business? Let's talk about the waterfall business-wide, across OTT and across theatrical. Let's see how the pie is being modeled, because what we have been told is, "Because we are putting the money, we take fifty percent." What the end creator is being left down to is a salary. So he'll charge the highest salary, and there's nothing wrong with that.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath1:24:01

       I also resonate with him from a very free market principle, capitalism standpoint. If somebody is paying for a certain service, I don't think we can blame the person who's charging for that service.

    9. ABAjay Bijli1:24:16

       No, no, not at all. All, all I'm saying is that, uh, like you said, all, uh, you know, everybody's not the same. When we were doing production, and I'm not saying we were holier than thou or anything like that, but I found that, um, uh, we were putting everything on the table, um, you know, for sharing and stuff, and yet, um, the, the actor fee and the talent fee would not come down, regardless of his performance in the previous film. So sometime-- all I'm saying is that sometimes a haircut is also important.... because you look at-

    10. VSVijay Subramaniam1:24:48

        Ajay, so the haircut's happening.

    11. ABAjay Bijli1:24:49

        Huh.

    12. VSVijay Subramaniam1:24:50

        I can assure you, as we speak-

    13. ABAjay Bijli1:24:52

        Yeah

    14. VSVijay Subramaniam1:24:52

        ... being in the business right now-

    15. ABAjay Bijli1:24:52

        Yeah, but, but there's an assumption that the produ- producer and the financier will not be transparent. I'm saying even if you're transparent, and the script is good, the creative aspect is good, sometimes the movie became unviable.

    16. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:04

        No, because-

    17. ABAjay Bijli1:25:05

        Because-

    18. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:05

        But-

    19. ABAjay Bijli1:25:05

        Huh

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:05

        ... but transparency,

    21. ABAjay Bijli1:25:07

        Huh.

    22. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:07

        "" model.

    23. ABAjay Bijli1:25:09

        Uh.

    24. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:09

        But transparency-

    25. ABAjay Bijli1:25:11

        Nie, Sherw, ek, ek, ek example, I don't want to give any more names-

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:13

        Yeah

    27. ABAjay Bijli1:25:14

        ... where actually the back end happened.

    28. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:15

        Mm.

    29. ABAjay Bijli1:25:15

        And it worked for everybody. Uh-

    30. VSVijay Subramaniam1:25:17

        No, I know multiple examples.
23. 1:38:00 – 1:41:16

    Writers, Scripts, Action : We Need Better Stories!

    1. SSSajith Sivanandan1:38:00

       People buy 12 things in, like, a week on an e-commerce platform.

    2. VSVijay Subramaniam1:38:04

       No, I'm with you.

    3. SSSajith Sivanandan1:38:05

       Right?

    4. VSVijay Subramaniam1:38:05

       Hence, I-

    5. SSSajith Sivanandan1:38:06

       Hence, no, hence, I'm saying the barrier to entry in this business is much higher. [scoffs]

    6. NKNikhil Kamath1:38:11

       So there's no way to do, like, a UPI of script writing, for instance, like just totally-

    7. VSVijay Subramaniam1:38:16

       Will he get the time from day or from your content head? I don't think so.

    8. SSSajith Sivanandan1:38:20

       No, but that's the point, no. You, you, you're likely... There are likely to be 10,000 scripts. How, how for one person to kind of-

    9. VSVijay Subramaniam1:38:26

       And there are six platforms.

    10. SSSajith Sivanandan1:38:27

        How do you get to... How can you assess, like, that the script's worthy of getting to that content head?

    11. VSVijay Subramaniam1:38:34

        There's an entire creative community that does that. How is it any different than modeling, for example?

    12. NKNikhil Kamath1:38:38

        What if you put all the scripts on a platform-

    13. VSVijay Subramaniam1:38:42

        Possible

    14. NKNikhil Kamath1:38:42

        ... and script writers rate each other, and that hierarchy helps somebody-

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan1:38:47

        There's a moral hazard there, no, though, uh-

    16. NKNikhil Kamath1:38:49

        Is it?

    17. VSVijay Subramaniam1:38:50

        Yeah.

    18. SSSajith Sivanandan1:38:51

        I mean, you're, you're just incentivized naturally to... But how is that different from... I, I guess I'm just thinking aloud, like, you know, for when, when, when scientific papers are published-

    19. NKNikhil Kamath1:39:00

        Yeah

    20. SSSajith Sivanandan1:39:01

        ... it's the same only. Maybe there is a possibility.

    21. NKNikhil Kamath1:39:03

        Yeah, and it's a way to retain-

    22. SSSajith Sivanandan1:39:04

        Maybe there's a possibility

    23. NKNikhil Kamath1:39:05

        ... ownership, because the guy who posted it will be recorded amongst that chain.

    24. SSSajith Sivanandan1:39:08

        Yeah.

    25. NKNikhil Kamath1:39:09

        And he will always have credit for what he posted.

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam1:39:10

        But Nikhil, your problem there will be even then, because writing is not a front of camera sexy business.

    27. NKNikhil Kamath1:39:17

        Mm-hmm.

    28. VSVijay Subramaniam1:39:18

        The only way to incentivize for someone to have a career in writing-

    29. NKNikhil Kamath1:39:21

        Mm

    30. VSVijay Subramaniam1:39:22

        ... is by off the board announcing a commercial construct that they know that this can become a career.
24. 1:41:16 – 1:46:52

    The Celebrity Market

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:16

       But coming back to market size, like they established [laughing] we had to get there.

    2. SSSajith Sivanandan1:41:22

       Can you corner him on something at least? [laughing]

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:25

       Yeah. [laughing]

    4. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:25

       [laughing]

    5. SSSajith Sivanandan1:41:26

       I also like the way how, how, how well he changed the whole narrative-

    6. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:29

       Yeah

    7. SSSajith Sivanandan1:41:29

       ... about it being stars to, like-

    8. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:31

       Now it looks like he defended writers all along. [laughing]

    9. VSVijay Subramaniam1:41:33

       Yeah. [laughing]

    10. SSSajith Sivanandan1:41:34

        But we were talking about something-

    11. VSVijay Subramaniam1:41:35

        There's a strong logic.

    12. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:36

        I have to actually ask him, how, how big a part did he play? I wouldn't like to say problem, but in inflating actor salaries. [chuckles]

    13. SSSajith Sivanandan1:41:46

        But he's incentivized to do, so he's only doing his job-

    14. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:48

        Yeah

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan1:41:48

        ... so to be fair. [chuckles]

    16. NKNikhil Kamath1:41:49

        To be fair, there's nothing wrong with it, but we can still ask how big of a part he played.

    17. VSVijay Subramaniam1:41:54

        I think I played the same part that the producers played when- [laughing] ... suddenly their digital acquisition rights of films shot up and people were paying any money during the pandemic to acquire rights, that-

    18. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:06

        And if you had to predict, in five years from now, what percentage... Say, today, an actor gets paid hundred. Five years from now, will he get paid 70 or 130?

    19. VSVijay Subramaniam1:42:18

        I think he'll get paid, the current model, 130.

    20. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:21

        It depends on his performance, yeah.

    21. VSVijay Subramaniam1:42:23

        I mean, he's saying, assuming all goes well.

    22. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:25

        Uh, assuming it, yeah.

    23. VSVijay Subramaniam1:42:26

        Everything is going to the... If everything's going to the shitter, then [laughing] I'm guessing he's going to the shitter as well.

    24. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:32

        All I'm saying-

    25. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:32

        Establish market size.

    26. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:33

        Yeah. [chuckles]

    27. VSVijay Subramaniam1:42:34

        Tough, because-

    28. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:35

        Uh

    29. VSVijay Subramaniam1:42:36

        ... models are very, very different. Uh, and-

    30. NKNikhil Kamath1:42:38

        E-establish Bollywood actors getting paid more m-market size. Simply.
25. 1:46:52 – 1:53:34

    Future of Content and Influencers

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:46:52

       topic: future of content.

    2. VSVijay Subramaniam1:46:54

       Absolutely.

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:46:55

       Uh, first subtopic, if I might bring up, social media influencers of all kind, uh, be it around tech, finance, uh, creative stuff like fashion, designing, all of that. They appeared out of nowhere a few years ago. Are they eating out of the same pie, or are they growing the pie? And their significance has definitely gone up in the last five years. Do you think that trend will continue to a point where they become bigger than the stars of yesterday? If not, why? If yes, why?

    4. VSVijay Subramaniam1:47:39

       So, great question. I get asked this literally in every interview that the media talks to us about. I mean, it's a completely accretive model. It's not-

    5. NKNikhil Kamath1:47:52

       Explain.

    6. VSVijay Subramaniam1:47:52

       It's not eating into a pie, it's growing the pie. Because it's not like today, social... So if there are a hundred pieces-

    7. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:00

       But I'll, I'll say this-

    8. VSVijay Subramaniam1:48:01

       Hmm

    9. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:01

       ... my bandwidth to consume content is not unlimited.

    10. VSVijay Subramaniam1:48:07

        Correct.

    11. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:07

        It's not, it's not that just because a new form of entertainment arrived, I have two extra hours in my day.

    12. SSSajith Sivanandan1:48:14

        No, no, time is finite.

    13. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:15

        Yeah.

    14. SSSajith Sivanandan1:48:15

        Highly perishable.

    15. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:17

        You can, you can substitute what you're watching.

    16. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:19

        That's my question exactly.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:21

        Yeah.

    18. VSVijay Subramaniam1:48:21

        No, so I'm not saying-

    19. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:21

        Are we substituting what we used to watch through stars and actors? If I had two hours in a day to consume content, did I take away one hour and give it to social media?

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam1:48:32

        You're not, you're not taking away from someone, you're adding on to someone. You're another podcast that I'm adding to my day.

    21. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:38

        No, but I'm taking away that time from the same user, which is-

    22. VSVijay Subramaniam1:48:41

        I don't know whether it's the same user, and that's where the, that's where the value is increasing.

    23. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:44

        Hmm.

    24. VSVijay Subramaniam1:48:46

        The best way for me to gauge this is influencer marketing.

    25. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:48

        Hmm.

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam1:48:48

        Right? Hypothetically, advertiser X has increased his marketing budget. It's not like he had a hundred dollars and he used to pay a cricketer thirty, a Bollywood star forty, and put media in seventy.

    27. NKNikhil Kamath1:48:59

        But do you think that's accurate? 'Cause if I'm a company X, which sells shoes-

    28. VSVijay Subramaniam1:49:05

        Hmm

    29. NKNikhil Kamath1:49:05

        ... my advertising budget per year is fifty rupees. I'm not going to increase that budget because there is another kind of creator out there. I'm going to split my budget.

    30. VSVijay Subramaniam1:49:15

        ... my endorsement business, which is the traditional celebrity endorsement business, is growing at a fairly good clip.
26. 1:53:34 – 1:57:40

    Where is Media Heading?

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:53:34

       Also, is another trend that content consumers are getting disillusioned by corporations per se, and leaning more towards fragmented distribution? Like, I will trust, uh, Person X, but not the news agency if they were to publish something. Do you think that's a trend in the market?

    2. VSVijay Subramaniam1:53:59

       I didn't-

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:00

       Right now, I consume my news from Corporation ABC.

    4. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:03

       Mm-hmm.

    5. SSSajith Sivanandan1:54:04

       Mm.

    6. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:04

       ABC has reporters one, two, three, four, five.

    7. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:08

       Yeah.

    8. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:09

       Is the world moving in the trend that tomorrow I don't want to go to ABC, but I want to go to those one, two, three, four, or five, because I will associate and resonate with one, two, three, four, five, versus ABC?

    9. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:27

       I think there is still credibility left for channels as well.

    10. SSSajith Sivanandan1:54:30

        Credibility is important, yeah.

    11. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:30

        Yeah.

    12. SSSajith Sivanandan1:54:31

        Credibility is important.

    13. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:32

        But is credibility moving from consolidation to fragmentation?

    14. SSSajith Sivanandan1:54:35

        I see your point, I see your point.

    15. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:37

        Uh, again, both are happening, uh, again, there are sometimes you-

    16. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:39

        I think it, it's either moving in this direction or that.

    17. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:42

        But if, I mean, some journalists or somebody who you like, you can follow him also, but-

    18. SSSajith Sivanandan1:54:47

        That's what I'm saying.

    19. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:47

        Not until, not until very recently, that was not possible.

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:50

        Um, yeah.

    21. SSSajith Sivanandan1:54:50

        Right.

    22. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:51

        But now you can.

    23. VSVijay Subramaniam1:54:52

        Now you can, yeah, yeah.

    24. SSSajith Sivanandan1:54:53

        Yeah.

    25. NKNikhil Kamath1:54:53

        So do you think that will be the future, where people will follow individual journalists they like, versus an assortment in aggregated-

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam1:55:04

        Like a TV channel, news channel, like NDTV and B- BBC or something?

    27. SSSajith Sivanandan1:55:07

        Yeah. You have to stretch this out, Nikhil, right?

    28. NKNikhil Kamath1:55:09

        Mm.

    29. SSSajith Sivanandan1:55:09

        Like, so if you take a 10, 15-year view, and you take a look at essentially digital natives, like people who were born in this-

    30. VSVijay Subramaniam1:55:16

        Mm
27. 1:57:40 – 1:59:26

    Gaming's Emergence: Threats & Transformations

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:57:40

       Correct

    2. SSSajith Sivanandan1:57:40

       ... as expert.

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:57:41

       Do you think gaming is big competition for all of you guys?

    4. SPSpeaker1:57:44

       Uh.

    5. NKNikhil Kamath1:57:45

       The share, the mind space share of gaming has been going up significantly.

    6. SPSpeaker1:57:51

       Mm.

    7. NKNikhil Kamath1:57:51

       And the scale of gaming is incredible. And the, the thing with gaming, unlike what all three of you do, is it's interactive.

    8. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:00

       Yeah.

    9. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:00

       It's two-way. There's feedback. Uh, that in itself innately makes it very attractive. Do you think gaming is a serious threat when all three of you are vying for that same two, three hours of somebody's time?

    10. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:15

        See, all of these things, whether it be gaming, sports, movies-

    11. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:19

        Correct

    12. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:20

        ... TVs, you know, they are essentially, they're products.

    13. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:25

        Mm.

    14. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:25

        They are all... And if you, again, abstract them further, they're telling stories.

    15. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:29

        Mm.

    16. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:30

        If that story sucks, I guarantee you that game is not gonna fly, just as much as a movie won't fly-

    17. SPSpeaker1:58:35

        Yeah

    18. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:35

        ... just as much as a-

    19. SPSpeaker1:58:36

        Yeah

    20. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:36

        ... that, that boring match won't fly either.

    21. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:39

        Right.

    22. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:39

        So the point that I- the way I at least talk to the team about is, look, we have to work hard-

    23. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:45

        Mm

    24. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:46

        ... to earn the, that right of time.

    25. SPSpeaker1:58:49

        Attention. Yeah.

    26. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:50

        Right.

    27. SPSpeaker1:58:51

        Yeah.

    28. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:51

        So if you tell a great story-

    29. NKNikhil Kamath1:58:53

        Mm

    30. SSSajith Sivanandan1:58:54

        ... I guarantee that people, maybe not today, but will tomorrow or day after, they will put that game down for-
28. 1:59:26 – 2:01:35

    AI's Role in Content Creation

    1. NKNikhil Kamath1:59:27

       If tomorrow you're able to create a show, deep fake or-

    2. SSSajith Sivanandan1:59:34

       Mm

    3. NKNikhil Kamath1:59:34

       ... automatically generate actors' expressions-

    4. SPSpeaker1:59:37

       [chuckles]

    5. NKNikhil Kamath1:59:37

       ... all of that, in a manner where you don't have to... I, I hate to sound condescending when I talk about actors, I won't say tantrums.

    6. SSSajith Sivanandan1:59:46

       [laughing]

    7. NKNikhil Kamath1:59:48

       But [chuckles] not deal with any of that. Have, like, the most efficient machine kind of a model, which will allow you to create a show from start to finish in probably a fraction of the time. Would you have any aversion towards adopting technology like that? It will also help the multiplex industry, likely.

    8. SPSpeaker2:00:09

       Well, the strike is all about that, not having guardrails on CG, not having guardrails on AI-

    9. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:15

       Yeah

    10. SPSpeaker2:00:15

        ... writers and actors.

    11. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:17

        I think as long as you feel a sentiment towards an actor, because that's what act stars, that in a, in a sense, I think it's very difficult for AI to-

    12. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:24

        So, so you mean, you mean sentiment towards a human being-

    13. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:27

        Yeah

    14. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:27

        ... who happens to be a star?

    15. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:29

        Yeah.

    16. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:29

        I see your point.

    17. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:29

        I mean, if he's alive, you as a fan would not... Even if you give me the same guy.

    18. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:34

        But, Vijay, the point is-

    19. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:35

        I don't know

    20. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:35

        ... I'm not sure, certainly I am not in a position today to, to be able to say that people won't gravitate to that person or not, because I don't think it's been done yet, properly.

    21. SPSpeaker2:00:46

        Absolutely.

    22. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:46

        I think I framed that-

    23. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:47

        Uh

    24. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:47

        ... question incorrectly.

    25. SPSpeaker2:00:48

        Yeah.

    26. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:48

        I didn't mean actors who are already here. [laughing]

    27. SPSpeaker2:00:50

        Right.

    28. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:51

        But you get the perfect actor then, right? Like, the director-

    29. SSSajith Sivanandan2:00:54

        Exactly

    30. NKNikhil Kamath2:00:54

        ... gets exactly what he wants.
29. 2:01:35 – 2:04:33

    OTT's Selection Criteria

    1. NKNikhil Kamath2:01:35

       Mm. How do you greenlight original content? If I'm building content for Hotstar, three things-

    2. SSSajith Sivanandan2:01:41

       Mm

    3. NKNikhil Kamath2:01:41

       ... that you watch out for?

    4. VSVijay Subramaniam2:01:42

       ... uh, I mean, um, the content team actually drives that. [laughing]

    5. NKNikhil Kamath2:01:47

       [laughing] What do they, what do they look out for?

    6. VSVijay Subramaniam2:01:49

       The, so the content team looks for, to be fair, a great story.

    7. NKNikhil Kamath2:01:53

       Mm.

    8. VSVijay Subramaniam2:01:54

       Uh, they do look for the arc.

    9. NKNikhil Kamath2:01:56

       Mm.

    10. VSVijay Subramaniam2:01:57

        And yes, w-who are the- who, who's gonna go play it, right? Like, who can they... Who can they play it? Who can- who's gonna direct it? Uh-

    11. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:04

        If I had to use a hack to put myself up on the list, and I'm creating some original content, what, what do I need to do?

    12. VSVijay Subramaniam2:02:10

        So some of it is like Formula A, because we've known that, you know, genres like, uh, mystery, murder, et cetera, they tend to... Or this whole drama piece, they tend to, they tend to sort of travel more.

    13. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:24

        Mm.

    14. VSVijay Subramaniam2:02:25

        So you'll get a better chance of getting green-lit there.

    15. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:28

        Mm.

    16. VSVijay Subramaniam2:02:28

        Uh, throw in a couple of big names-

    17. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:30

        Mm

    18. VSVijay Subramaniam2:02:30

        ... better chance of getting it [chuckles] uh, uh, there. Throw in a great director-

    19. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:35

        Mm

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam2:02:35

        ... better chance of, uh, getting, uh, green-lit there, yes.

    21. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:39

        Okay.

    22. VSVijay Subramaniam2:02:39

        So it's a combination of those things.

    23. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:40

        Okay.

    24. ABAjay Bijli2:02:40

        Uh, creativity and commerce is something that should happen hand in-

    25. VSVijay Subramaniam2:02:44

        Hand in hand

    26. ABAjay Bijli2:02:45

        ... hand in hand. It is showbiz. I know it's a very clichéd thing to say.

    27. NKNikhil Kamath2:02:48

        Mm.

    28. ABAjay Bijli2:02:48

        And, um, uh, and if it's just content for, uh, you know, like a platform, uh, then, you know, the pilot is important, the script is important, what you put together, and then, of course, it'll get green-lit. And if it's for- it's a feature film, then again, um, uh, you should be well aware of, uh, what the returns of that content are going to be.

    29. NKNikhil Kamath2:03:11

        From years of managing-

    30. ABAjay Bijli2:03:12

        [chuckles]
30. 2:04:33 – 2:06:23

    Distinguishing Unique Qualities of Major Talent

    1. NKNikhil Kamath2:04:33

       personal question for you. You manage many actors and actresses who are, in a sense, trying to get... land the same role. How do you decide in your head if talent A, you manage, is better than talent B, you manage, for that role that both of them want?

    2. VSVijay Subramaniam2:04:51

       Well, I think the truth of the matter is, uh, this is where in the company there are very clear-cut agent systems, where each agent pushes the agenda of their respective clients. And eventually, because, you know, a film is not a... Eventually, the director, it's the director's call, right? More often than not, it's the director who sees-

    3. NKNikhil Kamath2:05:10

       Mm

    4. VSVijay Subramaniam2:05:10

       ... the frame or not.

    5. NKNikhil Kamath2:05:11

       Mm.

    6. VSVijay Subramaniam2:05:12

       So eventually the directors do take the call, but I think the way to devise that is by creating a system where everybody has a shot at it, and the director-

    7. NKNikhil Kamath2:05:19

       Mm

    8. VSVijay Subramaniam2:05:19

       ... eventually takes, takes a call at that. Uh, I think the most, for me, the what, what I look at, at talent the most is, are you here for the buck?

    9. ABAjay Bijli2:05:32

       Yeah.

    10. VSVijay Subramaniam2:05:33

        Are you here for a vision? I intend to invest time, energy, and effort on reason for existence. Why should you be there? Uh, that's what I keep asking them. Why do we need another, another person?

    11. NKNikhil Kamath2:05:49

        And what is the right answer?

    12. VSVijay Subramaniam2:05:51

        What do you have to give that's different?

    13. ABAjay Bijli2:05:52

        I think commitment is very important.

    14. VSVijay Subramaniam2:05:54

        No, some of... Some-something, some, some of it can be as brutally cold as somebody can be... Somebody can look a certain way, which the market demands, right?

    15. ABAjay Bijli2:06:02

        I mean, I think commitment to the craft is still-

    16. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:04

        Commitment to the craft is-

    17. ABAjay Bijli2:06:06

        What, what has taken them there-

    18. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:07

        ... Like any other business, yeah?

    19. ABAjay Bijli2:06:08

        Yeah.

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:08

        What's your reason to exist?

    21. ABAjay Bijli2:06:09

        Yeah, yeah.

    22. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:09

        What do you have that's-

    23. ABAjay Bijli2:06:10

        Yeah

    24. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:10

        ... separate from the person?

    25. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:11

        Just because you're an actor or you're in a, in a glamourous doesn't mean you should-

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:14

        These three things are what I do. So typically, we do vision-setting exercises, which are very clear, where do you want to be?

    27. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:20

        Mm-hmm. Right. Okay, so the

31. 2:06:23 – 2:08:59

    Nikhil's personal opinion on panellists

    1. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:23

       last section, if somebody does not want to start a business-

    2. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:28

       Sure

    3. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:28

       ... but wants to invest in one, either on the private side or public side, I know there are public companies [laughing] here, which I will talk about a little bit.

    4. ABAjay Bijli2:06:36

       [chuckles]

    5. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:37

       Uh, recommendations.

    6. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:38

       Shit! That's a very difficult question to ask me.

    7. ABAjay Bijli2:06:43

       I'm not even going to answer. [laughing]

    8. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:46

       [laughing]

    9. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:46

       You can't answer it right now.

    10. ABAjay Bijli2:06:48

        You, uh, you want a name of a company-

    11. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:51

        Yeah

    12. ABAjay Bijli2:06:51

        ... in, in this field? Oh, I, I... That's a tough-

    13. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:54

        I can give you my view-

    14. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:56

        Yeah

    15. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:56

        ... 'cause this is my job.

    16. VSVijay Subramaniam2:06:57

        You have many, so [laughs] you are an expert here.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath2:06:59

        Yeah. Uh, I've had some exposure with, uh, Ajay, as he knows. PVR, I have had a long relationship with, from a stock point of view.

    18. VSVijay Subramaniam2:07:09

        Mm.

    19. NKNikhil Kamath2:07:09

        Sir, I bought 2%, so I invested a reasonable chunk of money, which I still hold to the day. I don't know, 2% has gotten diluted after the merger, but whatever-

    20. VSVijay Subramaniam2:07:19

        [chuckles]

    21. NKNikhil Kamath2:07:19

        ... diluted number is, I still have. The thing I like about Ajay, like, uh, Ajay's ability to remain resilient-

    22. VSVijay Subramaniam2:07:28

        Mm

    23. NKNikhil Kamath2:07:29

        ... during the pandemic, especially during the pandemic, and not significantly take up the debt of PVR, needed some God level of negotiation skills, and he pulled it off.

    24. VSVijay Subramaniam2:07:43

        [chuckles]

    25. NKNikhil Kamath2:07:43

        And to have-

    26. VSVijay Subramaniam2:07:44

        Salute

    27. ABAjay Bijli2:07:44

        I don't know.

    28. NKNikhil Kamath2:07:45

        Someone like him at the helm of a company, I think is, uh, incredible.

    29. SSSajith Sivanandan2:07:50

        ... you know, thank this kind of-

    30. NKNikhil Kamath2:07:52

        And, uh, talking about Sajith, I feel like he's in a business where ninety-nine out of hundred people would be enamored by the surroundings and make one out of a hundred decisions based on that. Uh, knowing Sajith like I do, uh, I think he would never.
32. 2:08:59 – 2:12:32

    Second Edition : Pick A Charity and be part of something Incredible!

    1. NKNikhil Kamath2:08:59

       The last bit, this being a charity-

    2. ABAjay Bijli2:09:03

       Mm

    3. NKNikhil Kamath2:09:04

       ... every time somebody comes on this podcast-

    4. ABAjay Bijli2:09:06

       Mm

    5. NKNikhil Kamath2:09:07

       ... uh, they all commit to give away a certain amount to charity.

    6. ABAjay Bijli2:09:11

       Mm.

    7. NKNikhil Kamath2:09:12

       And, uh, the money doesn't come to me because I have too many charities in life-

    8. ABAjay Bijli2:09:18

       Mm

    9. NKNikhil Kamath2:09:18

       ... I'm part of, I can't do one more. [chuckles] The money goes directly to charity, but we let the audience decide which charity the money goes to. So for example, you three say an amount, and then you pick a charity each. We put out a poll, uh, we put out a poll with the names of four charities and the amount that has to be donated. Audience, in a democratic way, votes, and the winner of that week-

    10. ABAjay Bijli2:09:43

        Mm

    11. NKNikhil Kamath2:09:43

        ... gets the money.

    12. ABAjay Bijli2:09:44

        Okay.

    13. NKNikhil Kamath2:09:45

        So what I want from you guys is an amount and the name of a charity. The reason we are doing this is I have experienced this myself in my life. Uh, there is a certain kind of satisfaction, uh... In a very twisted way, it is also selfish.

    14. ABAjay Bijli2:10:03

        Mm.

    15. NKNikhil Kamath2:10:04

        When you're helping some cause, you're not being a hundred percent altruistic. You're doing it for some kind of ap- appeasement of your own moral- morality, which also in turn helps you, but let's not go so like, you know, twisted into the- [chuckles] ... deeper layer. But, uh, I think to make giving and participating in the community cool, is the point of this. And to-- The thing is, once the audience picks a charity and they see the result of it, when the money goes there, we are hoping next time, without us, they do it on their own. Very simple.

    16. ABAjay Bijli2:10:42

        Sure.

    17. NKNikhil Kamath2:10:42

        So the amount doesn't matter, whatever. So you guys can just commit amount.

    18. ABAjay Bijli2:10:46

        I mean, I'm very closely associated with our own charity, PVR Nest, only.

    19. NKNikhil Kamath2:10:50

        Mm.

    20. ABAjay Bijli2:10:50

        Which is building-

    21. NKNikhil Kamath2:10:51

        Yeah

    22. ABAjay Bijli2:10:51

        ... ladies toilets and-

    23. NKNikhil Kamath2:10:53

        Wow

    24. ABAjay Bijli2:10:53

        ... throughout, and, uh, pink toilets.

    25. NKNikhil Kamath2:10:55

        Yeah.

    26. ABAjay Bijli2:10:55

        And also picking up people around our cinemas-

    27. NKNikhil Kamath2:10:58

        Mm

    28. ABAjay Bijli2:10:58

        ... who are in slums and stuff like that, talking to their parents, and then giving them not just education, but employment as well. So that's very close to our heart.

    29. NKNikhil Kamath2:11:07

        Okay.

    30. ABAjay Bijli2:11:07

        Uh, PVR Nest, it's called.
33. 2:12:32 – 2:13:47

    A Surprise Jam Session

    1. SPSpeaker2:12:58

       [laughing] Roti khaya?

    2. SSSajith Sivanandan2:13:00

       Definitely, it was nice. [singing]

34. 2:13:47 – 2:13:55

    Outro

    1. NKNikhil Kamath2:13:47

       Hi, I'm Nikhil Kamath. I'd love to know what you thought of the episode. Uh, comment, like, and subscribe, and thank you for watching.

Episode duration: 2:13:55