Tata Sky keen to increase kids offerings

Either to add new channels or get back earlier ones that had exited this market

Direct-to-home major Tata Sky is keen to expand kids offerings either by bringing new channels onto its platform or getting back some of the channels which had exited this market.

"Kids (segment) is an area which is particularly interesting. We carry everything today that is available for kids in this market.

"We are working with a couple of partners to get new channels or bring back some of the channels that exited this market as kids are certainly one key area for us," Tata Sky chief content and business development officer Paolo Agostinelli told PTI here.

The DTH player airs channels like Hungama TV, Disney XD, Disney Channel, Nick HD+, Nick (Nickelodeon), Sonic Nickelodeon, Nick Jr, Cartoon Network, Pogo, Discovery Kids, Baby TV, Disney Junior, Zee Q, Toonami, Chutti TV, Kushi TV, Chintu TV and Kochu TV, for children.

Kids channels like CBeebies, which is from the BBC stable, and the Japanese channel Animax, among others, have exited the country in recent past.

According to a recent Ficci-KPMG report, as India has one of the largest population of kids watching cartoons in the world (about 200 million), the need for content for them (kids) is growing.

Over the past few years, the viewership of such channels has been steady - 6.7 per cent in 2012, 7.5 per cent in 2013 and 7.3 per cent in 2014, the report noted.

Recently, Tata Sky added international English news channel -- Channel NewsAsia International -- on its platform and Agostinelli said the company will look to add more international news channels.

"We are not in the business of adding number of channels but we are definitely are in a position to add more because we finally have a bit more of capacity, so we are trying to expand.

"Any good channel, for example a European channel, we think there could be a couple of opportunities there, to open up our window on Europe as a world. We are talking about international news channels," he said.

Tata Sky had recently added Singaporean Channel NewsAsia International, taking its number of news channels to 96, which include 14 English, 22 Hindi and 57 regional channels.

The company offers 400 channels across genres, including 51 in HD, 190 regional channels and 10 Actve services (interactive services).

He said the company will be adding another Actve service next month.