TAM promoter challenges new TV ratings

Kantar Research has a 50% stake in TAM

A shareholder of TAM Media Research, the country’s sole television ratings agency, has moved the high court in Delhi against the new guidelines in the segment notified by the central government.

Advertising giant WPP’s Kantar Research, which has half the equity in TAM (the other half is with Nielsen), has filed a petition saying the new guidelines mean it will have to go out of business. The guidelines prevent any one from having paid-up equity in excess of 10 per cent simultaneously in both a rating agency and a broadcaster, advertiser or advertising agency. TAM was given 30 days to undo its cross-holdings. After hearing the Kantar counsel on Wednesday,the HC adjourned the matter to the coming Wednesday. While legal recourse was expected, what has surprised many is the move by Kantar alone to approach the courts. Nielsen, the other shareholder, has not opted to be a party to the petition.

The move by Kantar, however, is a relief for advertisers and media agencies, unprepared for a media-dark environment as the first half of 2014 has key TV properties. This includes the second season of Satyamev Jayate on STAR Plus, slated for a March launch, the seventh season of the Indian Premier League cricket tournament, due April-end or early May, and the general elections, on through April-May.

Arvind Sharma, president, Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI), had said: “Absence of TRP data will not help (media) agencies and advertisers because there will be no  basis  to buying advertising time. This will be detrimental to the TV advertising business.”

A new system under the  Broadcasters Audience Research Council (BARC), backed by the Indian Society of Advertisers, Indian Broadcasting Federation and AAAI, is expected to be launched by October. On Monday, BARC announced a tie-up with France’s Mediametrie for technology services and licensing of a television metering system. The six-year contract will see the two setting up the technology infrastructure of another ratings system.

The new rating system will begin the service with a panel size of 20,000 compared to one of 9,600 that TAM currently provides. The target is to have a panel size of 50,000 in due course. This is in consonance with the new policy cleared by the Union Cabinet, under which a television ratings provider should have a panel size of at least 20,000.  The guidelines also mandate the number of panel homes should increase by 10,000 every year to eventually touch 50,000.