Discovery launches sports channel DSport

The network launches its first ever sports channel in India

Discovery Networks India has decided to go the sports route for increasing its reach and penetration in the country. The network, which has 11 infotainment channels in India, launched its first sports channel DSports on Monday. With this, it enters a market currently led by broadcasters Star and Sony Pictures Network. 

Traditionally, Discovery’s content has been skewed towards a metro audience, the SEC A and B markets in the top six to eight metros. However, over the past five years, the network has focused its efforts on creating local content to penetrate deeper into the regional markets. As a result, Hindi feeds of most of its channels have been made available and some channels, like the flagship Discovery channel, also have a separate Tamil channel. Investigation Discovery, which the network launched a couple of years back is available only in Hindi. 

Karan Bajaj, senior vice president and general manager, Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific said, “The next step is to expand the reach. We want to expand the reach of the network beyond the metros to the tier 2 and 3 markets. At the same time, we want to capture a greater market through different genres by filling in gaps in the market.” Sports, he believes, will help with the latter. “We are excited to add yet another flagship brand with DSport. We will offer a daily dose of 10 plus hours of live content for viewers across the country,” he adds.

Launching with a targeted reach of 30 million through distribution platforms across DTH and cable digital companies, the channel will have an HD and SD feed. The 4,000-hour live sports library includes sports like horse-racing, football, golf, motor sports and rugby. DSport is in advanced negotiations for high quality cricket events to add to the portfolio, the channel said.

Globally, Discovery’s Europe operations have been focussed on growing the sports portfolio. It started its journey as a sports broadcaster in 2012 when it bought 20 per cent stake in Eurosport. By July 2015, the network had completely bought out the broadcaster and a few months later, invested as much as 1.3 billion euro to acquire Olympic media rights for Europe. The investment was further upped in a 4.6 billion euro deal that Discovery signed to share the Bundesliga rights with Sky in June last year, followed by acquiring the rights to Wimbledon in 15 European markets. 

“The network has been focussed on sports in Europe. But yes, outside that market, India is the first market that we are entering sports broadcasting,” says Bajaj. For the network, the addition of a sports channel in an already competitive market is to capture the faster growing sports like soccer. “Horse racing is one of the most attended sports (in terms of footfalls) in India, so there is a market for it. Similarly, football is viewed by 125 million people and golf has a reach of 65 million. We have three out of the four major tournaments in golf and tournaments like the Chinese Soccer League which are catching on internationally,” he adds.

While sports programming is aimed at its core viewer, Discovery is also going all out to appeal to audiences in the heartland. Bajaj’s plan is to have 200 hours of local content on the network’s flagship Discovery Channel by the end of 2017. This is a marked increase from the average five hours a year the network has been adding so far. “We have identified topics that will appeal to the tier 2 and 3 viewers. These include stories around crime (not household, but general), military (stories from the armed forces) and inspirational stories that follow a person’s journey to success. Of course since the scale of local productions has increased and we are investing in sports, it is safe to say that Discovery’s investment in India is no longer in ‘thousands of dollars’ but ‘millions’,” Bajaj said. 

With more local stories being added to the infotainment portfolio (the other brands like TLC are expected to follow suit), the core viewer who turns to Discovery for international infotainment content may get alienated. But the network is hoping that its coverage of global sporting events will help keep the balance. Also, the HD feeds will cater to the metro audience and the content for the HD and SD channels will be different. Currently channels like TLC have a different feed for the SD and HD channels. 

So while Discovery embarks on a reinvention journey of sorts in India, one cannot but ask — will it be worth it and is sports the right bet? Zee, a seasoned broadcaster exited the sports business finding the margins too meagre and costs high. Both Sony and Star are yet to make major profits on their sports bouquet while Neo Sports has pretty much slipped into oblivion. Will Discovery’s bet pay off and will its entry shake up the sports broadcast environment?