Sony to continue aggressive investment in country, says India MD Banerjee

Japan's Sony will continue to invest aggressively in India, one of its most important media and entertainment global markets, with an eye on creating compelling contents, according to a senior company official.

Sony Pictures Networks India (SPNI) Managing Director and CEO Gaurav Banerjee told PTI that the company is not concerned about competition from Jio Hotstar combine but is rather looking at "working together to figure out how best to entertain India".

SPNI is a part of Japanese conglomerate Sony Group Corporation that had announced to invest $ 1.575 billion while announcing the failed merger with Zee in September 2021.

Despite the failure of its merger with Zee, the company is open to explore alternative routes to grow, although the current focus is on growing and strengthening existing business, he added.

"It (India) is one of the most significant and important markets for Sony globally and the reason for that is simple. One is this is the largest country by population anywhere in the world. It's also the fastest growing major economy in the world," Banerjee said.

He further said,"It has got such an incredible share of young population, and therefore all the metrics are very well set for long-term growth and I think all of those things make it really exciting for Sony."  Banerjee, who recently completed 100 days in his new role, was responding to a query on how significant is India from Sony's global perspective.

Asked if Sony's commitment to invest over $ 1.5 billion while announcing the proposed merger with Zee still remained, Banerjee did not confirm the number but said the commitment in terms of investing in long term and grow the business is there.

"I wouldn't put a number to it, but I think anything that we need, from a resourcing point of view, we feel really confident about that," Banerjee said.

He further said,"We will continue to invest aggressively behind content... and we would want that is the most crucial investment that we do as a company."  Stressing on the need to invest aggressively on content, he said it is required due to changing nature of the industry.

In the last few years SPNI has become both a TV and a digital company, he said, adding "my understanding of what our business needs to be is that we need to be a content company first. We see ourselves as a place where amazing stories get told, and we are agnostic about the distribution guidelines (linear TV or streaming platforms)."  Asked about competition from the merger of the media assets of Reliance Industries and The Walt Disney Co, he said,"I believe that our business is not so much about competition as much as it is about excellence."  He acknowledged that the JV formed after the merger of Viacom 18 Media -- the holding company of Reliance Industries' media and entertainment assets - - - with Star India will definitely come up with " great content" and SPNI would strive to do the same.

"The game is therefore not really about competition. It's about how do work together to figure out how best to entertain India."  Banerjee also said the coming together of the two rivals was not a cause for concern stating "some amount of consolidation in this industry would be helpful".

Asked about SPNI's future growth strategy and if the company would stay away from merger after the failed deal with Zee, Banerjee said,"We are open to explore other alternatives to grow. We'd be happy to look at options."  However, he said the company's current key focus are the existing brands it has, the current lines of business, and how to make them better.