Hungama Mobile has stuck a deal to develop and distribute content from Paramount Digital Entertainment (PDE) in India South Asia. Pradeep Mittur, VP Interactive and Mobile for PDE says that “At this stage, this relationship is more about promotion of our movies, than trying to develop a new revenue stream”. Paramount and Hungama will also work closely with United International Pictures, reports Variety.
People in the industry tend to talk about Hungama Mobile as largely being dependent on T-Series for their content; some even forecast a doomsday scenario of T-Series not renewing their contract with the company…but as per the story, Hungama has deals with “16 record labels, 20 studios and 130 original content owners”, apparently spreading their risk. Key among these was the deal for the Tamil blockbuster Sivaji; they’ve also struck a deal for content from Pakistan, and with the GSMA and Roamware for the Mobile Bollywood Initiative. Hungama has also used the content that they have access to, to firm up distribution across the globe, which attracts more content owners. Question is, what percentage of their revenue is dependent on that one content owner – T-Series?
Update: Nothing on the revenue share of T-Series content, but Saeleem Mobhani, COO of Hungama informs us that they have also acquired rights to content from Sony (NYSE: SNE) Pictures and Fashion TV. For the doomsayers, Mobhani says that they’ve cracked the distribution side of the deals which is hard to replicate; the company is present in 33 countries, with offices in 6 of them. Hungama has around 77 partners and direct integration with carriers (not aggregators), he says. Apart from the deals mentioned above, Mobhani adds that Hungama has also acquired digital rights to content from the 40 of the next 50 films in South India, in partnership with producers and music label – including the rights of the next big film – Billa. So hardly a doomsday scenario for Hungama, it appears.
if you remove the CRBT and wallpapers, what is hungama distributing?
They started paying 12Crore(1st yr), than 30 crore(2nd yr) and now paying 50+ crore(for current yr) for T-series content is pure play gamble which the label has no problem. Label will actually play tough ball when they get to know of the upcoming IPO of Hungama Mobile.
It is a power of great deal making, taking risks and amazing distribution of hte most perishable item in the world. But hats off to the team which is making it profitable in the most difficult situation.