Pix sets sight on 25% pie in India

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Pix, the Indian Hollywood movie channel from Sony Entertainment Network, is gunning for a 25 per cent share of the domestic market in a year from now, primarily piggybacking on the new additions to its premier content library and new properties like First Watch India, Hand Pick Movie and Super Movie of the Month.

Star Movies currently reigns as the No 1 English movie channel in the country with a market share of about 25 per cent, while Pix's share is hovering between 18 per cent and 20 per cent.

“While the fact is that we have a lot of motion picture content from MGM and Sony libraries, what is driving us now is our fresh on-air look. In terms of marketing strategy, nobody else does it. Star Movies is based out of Hong Kong and HBO from Singapore and we are the only one who are actually on the ground (Mumbai),” says Sunder Aaron, executive vice-president and business head, Pix.

In the number game, Pix has so far outperformed the existing competing channels like Star Movies and HBO. Between June and August 2010, the channel aired 675 titles, leaving behind Star Movies with 608 and HBO with 576 titles. In the digital space, it has 8,600 members in an English channel group on Facebook, while Star Movies had 6,200 and HBO 2,400.

“Any given time, we will have close to 500 titles in our library. We are in there in the game with them (competition) competing on a week-to-week basis,” Aaron says.

According to a report from television viewership analysis company TAM Media, the number of digital TV households in India was 20 million and cable and satellite (C&S) households 90 million in 2009. Of this, English channels have a 4 per cent of the total TV viewership. At present, Pix has a 1.25-million viewership, a quarter of which is from the six metros.

“English channel viewership is growing at a rapid pace on the back of the increasing direct-to-home households. India itself is a large enough market for us,” says Aaron, while ruling out any possibility of beaming the channel outside of the country.

Pix will be launching Pix Movie Club, a special initiative created by the channel to encourage students to watch the best new Hollywood movies in town, in Hyderabad soon, he adds.