The digital media production company reaches 25 to 30 million unique viewers each week. Pocket Aces Pictures calls Ashwin Suresh, Anirudh Pandita and Aditi Shrivastava its cofounders. We speak to Ashwin in this series.
Why don’t you have more Hindi/native language content?
Our content is a combination of Hindi and English, the languages most commonly spoken by urban India - because that is where our audiences are predominantly from. Our content philosophy has always been to be as real as possible; to participate in conversations with our audiences in the manner and language that they are used to. Of course, as mobile penetration and internet reach increase over the coming years, we will see a demand for regional language content and we expect to be in a position to fulfill that demand.
In the next 20 years: What are your predictions for media and how it is consumed?
I’m not enough of a visionary to predict the future 20 years from now. The world changes too quickly to be able to see that far out. However, we are seeing certain trends that will shape media over the next few years. Digital, as a delivery medium, is here to stay.
The TV is likely to simply become a device on which we consume media, and over time, OTT platforms will provide a majority of content to consumers across the world. Traditional cohorts will be redefined, geographical boundaries will no longer be used to segment audiences as identity or interest based communities start to form globally. Social media and messaging platforms will become the largest distributors of media, and mobile phones the primary device on which this media is consumed.
Content formats will keep evolving - vertical video, live, 360, AR, etc. - and this evolution will continue to be pioneered by the likes of Facebook, Snapchat, and YouTube, who control large numbers of audiences and have a need to constantly innovate.
The democratisation of distribution will also lead to an improvement in the quality of content in markets like India, where for too long the quality has been dictated by reach platforms that need to create content for mass-appeal. Cheaper distribution allows us to segment audiences in smaller numbers and cater specifically to those segments; i.e. create something that 100 people will go absolutely nuts for vs. creating something that 1,000 people will only moderately like.
Read part 2 of this series here.
BW Reporters
Regina is a reporter for BW Businessworld. In her previous assignments, she has worked with Independent television Network as a news anchor and reporter in Sri Lanka
