Amazon Prime Videoâ€™s viewing hours have grown 3x in last 2 years: Gaurav Gandhi

“Overall, in the five years that the video streaming segment has been in India, it has seen a very strong growth. This has been powered by some fundamental changes in the wider eco-system that have provided strong tailwinds for the sector,” observed Gaurav Gandhi, Country Head, Amazon Prime Video India, during a fireside conversation at APOS India 2021, created and curated by Media Partners Asia (MPA), which was held virtually on November 23, 2021.

Sharing his views on the streaming video landscape in India, Gandhi said that the first of these tailwinds was the young demographic that makes for a large viewer base hungry for on-demand content. The second is that India is largely a single television market, and the ubiquitous smartphone in everyone’s hand is their personal television. The third, and a significant factor, is the rich and robust content ecosystem, with content industries in over 10 languages, making India a prolific entertainment market.

Gandhi further said, “In the last three or four years, streaming services have brought a new wave of high quality, world class content, including Original long-format series that India had not seen before – this is not just global content, but also local, home-grown stories. Streaming services also played another role – India has a large audience base that loves movies, but the country is very under-screened, thus, there is limited access a new movie in the very early window (theatres). Video streaming has enhanced the reach and accessibility of films.”

Talking about the changes in the last 2 years, he pointed out, “The last two years have turbo changed adoption of digital technology across sectors. Video streaming is now a daily habit for a large audience base – this was also propelled to a degree during the lockdowns, where there was higher reliance on OTT services for entertainment. Another important change has been the improvement in the digital payment infrastructure – people’s trust on making digital payments has increased significantly. Today, more than ever, customers see value in paying for high-quality and exclusive content, available to them on the devices and at the time of their choice. All of this demonstrates there is an incredible head-room for growth for this industry.”

When asked about what makes India one of the highest engaged locales for Prime Video service in the world, Gandhi spoke about programming for the diverse Indian viewers, “India is supremely heterogeneous, not just in terms of language, age segments, content appeal and affordability. Indian customers are excited about new, fresh and differentiated content that we have been programming to appeal to these segments – which is reflected in the exponential growth of Prime Video with its viewership from 99% of pincodes in the country. Our viewing hours have grown 3x in the last 2 years. This growth is primarily driven by three trends:

Growing appetite for binge-worthy Originals with authentic stories, broader appeal stories like ‘Mirzapur’ or ‘The Family Man’, or segment targeted stories like ‘Bandish Bandits’.
Early window digital premieres, soon after theatrical releases and close to 50 movies that released direct to service on Prime Video in the last year and a half.
Easy of access of wide variety of high-quality content is helping break language barriers. Viewers are watching content across languages today. Today, 50% of the viewership for Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, and Kannada DTS films on our platform comes from outside the home state. Similarly, international language content such as ‘Parasite’ last year or ‘Maradona: The Blessed Dream’ this year, is being viewed widely.”

When asked about what streaming services need to do to focus on retaining and engaging customers, Gandhi said, “In the streaming business, we are ultimately talking about securing a share of the customers’ wallets and their valuable time, and for that we need to continuously engage customers, provide them with compelling content that ensures that they stay on and come back month after month, week after week and day after day. It’s about capturing their imagination.”

Concluding the fireside session, the Amazon Prime Video Country Head spoke about the OTT platform’s role in the growth of the OTT sector and said, “We believe in partnering with the creative ecosystem to help grow the creative economy and give back to the Industry and the society – be it via creation of jobs, giving a platform for undiscovered creators and talent from local cities and towns of the nation or supporting skill building by working with educational institutions and the industry.”