Star India to acquire broadcast business of Maa TV

With an aim to bring in a wave of creative content innovation in Telugu television market, Star India will acquire the broadcast business of Maa Television Network.

The deal, which was announced via an official statement Wednesday, will be a win-win proposition for both the networks. While Star India will be able to make its presence felt in Telugu TV market, the Telugu TV market will also see variance content-wise.

With the deal, Star India, a unit of 21st Century Fox, looks to continue its tradition of innovation in content and building on the strong track record of Maa Television Network.

"The Telugu market is an important market. However, the pace of innovation has been slow. We are keen to change this by acquiring a local presence and fundamentally changing the content quality paradigm. We were very impressed by the solid creative core and quality and depth of the management team at Maa Television Network," said Uday Shankar, CEO, Star India.

Maa Television Network's chairman Nimmagadda Prasad says that the coming together of the two network houses will only add to the Telugu TV market.

"Star's leadership in Indian media and entertainment industry and its parent company's proven expertise in media business on global scale will enable Maa to offer more innovative, rich and differentiated entertainment content to the Telugu diaspora worldwide" Prasad said.

Maa Television Network is one of the largest broadcast network in Telugu language content and has a strong trajectory of growth driven by fiction content and movies.

The deal will come into effect upon complying with the necessary regulatory formalities and the broadcast business of Maa TV will be integrated with the business of Star India, once the policies and procedures in the acquired broadcast business of Maa TV are aligned with those at Star India.