Media - Broadcast

For the first time in 44 years (that is, since the time of inception), Doordarshan (DD) has hired the services of an advertising agency. In an even more decisive stance, the national broadcaster is working overtime to give final shape to an aggressive research and marketing plan. "Despite our reach and pre-eminent position in several areas, we are faced with an image problem. We are keen to...

The first thing that greets you when you step into the office of TV Live India (on the sixth floor of the Kanchanjunga building in New Delhi's Cannaught Place) is a steady stream of people flowing in and out of the office. The place is brimming with life. We found managing director Nalini Singh - who still evokes images of her firebrand style of journalism - seated next to her table, strewn with...

It's the dark horse in the battle for FM radio in Mumbai. It does not have the cross-media presence or heavy nationwide spread that Times Group's Radio Mirchi is counting on. It does not have the multi-media spread that Go 92.5, the FM radio foray of Mid-Day Multimedia, is hoping to bank on. What it has is programming, an advertising budget of Rs 1 crore, licenses for Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai...

If you are in the radio business, then this was one hectic week. The week saw the launch of WIN 94.6, a private 24-hour FM station, on April 29 by Millennium Broadcast. Entertainment Network India Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Bennett, Coleman & Company, formally launched Radio Mirchi in Pune on Wednesday. The station debuted in Mumbai last week. As the stations ease into the new FM radio...

Liberalisation has had many effects. Not the least, an upwardly mobile middle class, that aspires to international standards. It is a market that media companies have found fertile. Take Outlook Traveller, a full-fledged magazine looking to tap this market, or the feature pages devoted to hotels and travel in all major newspapers, and shows like Style South Asia on CNN, and Trend Mill on CNBC...

Around this time last year, Star News at Nine, a half-hour English news bulletin produced by New Delhi Television (NDTV) was moved from Star Plus to Star World. It was a step towards lending a total Hindi feel to Star Plus, and a more local feel to its estranged cousin Star World. While the first channel has rewritten success in Indian television history, Star World, which was targeted at the...

New channels, new programming genres, new marketing tactics - poll a random sample of media practitioners and they come out with these as the defining characteristics of Indian television in the recent past. I would like to add one, and right at the beginning, please - people. It's the new game in town - channel-surfing. It's partly due to new channels, partly due to the Net and partly due to the...