Nick unveils 5th local IP Rudra; a combination of risk & strategy: Nina Elavia Jaipuria

Kids’ channels in India have been fortifying their offering with more and more homegrown characters and IP. Last month, Discovery Kids had introduced its new series, ‘Little Singham’. Prior to that Chhota Bheem, Motu-Patlu, Shiva and a host of Indian toon characters have been enthralling kids. The latest to join this bandwagon is Prince of Magic ‘Rudra – Boom Chik Chik Boom’ on Nickelodeon. 

With this, Nickelodeon is all set to introduce, what it calls, India’s first Magictoon. A category first, Rudra is an magic comedy series that is will go on air from June 11, 2018 and will air every Monday to Friday at 7.25 pm. 

Nickelodeon has been identifying white spaces and has launched local home-grown Nicktoons such as ‘Pakdam Pakdai’, a chase comedy; ‘Motu Patlu’, the only adult protagonist in the kids’ animation category; ‘Shiva’, the whiz kid; and ‘Gattu Battu’, an animated detective series. With the launch of its fifth IP – ‘Rudra Boom Chik Chik Boom’, the franchise has forayed into the untapped genre of magic, emerging as a franchise with the widest array of local IPs. With a local content library of over 350 hours, Nickelodeon is now poised as a franchise with the largest and most versatile homegrown content library in the category. 

Nick introduced its first local IP – ‘Motu Patlu’ – in 2012. Since 2012, the channel has created over 350 hours of original content and is targeting to grow the local content to 500 hours by FY2019. 

 Produced by Greengold Animation, 9-year-old Rudra is a spirited and intelligent boy who lives in the magical Sun City with his grandfather Jai Singh, a supreme magician and patriarch. Always curious to learn, Rudra is being mentored by his grandfather to emerge as his successor and the greatest magician ever. Rudra’s journey in the world of magic is made exciting with his best friends Varun and Maira, who together protect Sun City from the Super-Evil magician Shakaal and his minions. The show has been written by Niraj Vikram. Noted lyricist and poet Gulzaar has once again scripted lyrics for the title track of the show, to be sung by Arhaan Hussain on music composed by Simaap Sen. 

Announcing the launch, Nina Elavia Jaipuria, Head – Kids Entertainment Cluster, Viacom18, said, “Nickelodeon has always introduced kids to characters that are inspiring, unique and endearing. Catering to children and their evolving preferences has been at the core of all our initiatives. It is with this intent that we have brought alive clutter-breaking and pioneering characters that have gone on to be category game changers and favourites amongst kids. Our new character Rudra is another category first and is sure to be much loved and adored by kids.” 

She further added, “We have been focused on creating an entire ecosystem for kids that extends beyond television to movies, on-ground, digital, experiential, consumer products and OTT, with our successful portfolio of iconic Made in India IPs. The launch of Rudra is set to add further depth to our portfolio and provide impetus to our objective of engaging kids and creating a dynamic kids ecosystem.” 

Commenting on the fifth IP launch of Nickelodeon, Anu Sikka, Head – Content, Kids Entertainment Cluster, Viacom18, said, “Magic has been an important part of India’s rich story-telling heritage, and children have always been enthralled by this genre. However, despite the interest there have been no kid’s characters that have been created out of India to cater to this need of our young viewers. The launch of Rudra will help plug this important need gap and provide kids a character that can take them into a new imaginary and mystical world of magic.” 

The show’s launch will be supported by a robust promotion plan across all the network channels. It will also be brought to life on social and digital through games and a high decibel outreach plan. The promotions will extend into the upcoming Back To School season through Nickelodeon’s expansive School Contact Programme, taking Rudra out of television screens into the daily life of kids. 

Risk along with strategy is a good combination: Nina Elavia Jaipuria

Adgully caught up with Nina Elavia Jaipuria to know more about the creation of Rudra, the strategy behind growing Nick's local IP, the shifts in the kids' genre in India and more. Excerpts: 

What is the thought behind launching a fifth local IP with Rudra?
Our strategy is not to depend on just one character to get the ratings, but bringing in more variety in our offering. Kids these days want new characters and stories, which also open the door for us to write that many good stories. 

The most important thing that works more in the kids’ genre and attracts them towards the channel is the storytelling. Second aspect is about how enduring your characters are. How quickly the bond between the characters and the kids are formed. And lastly, it is about the quality of animation and dubbing. 

How challenging was it to create Rudra?
It was very challenging, but I think that’s the key in terms of what you should do and what should be the characteristics of a particular character. Also, the research that we do show what the need gaps and white spaces are in this category. A lot of thinking goes behind the characters, because at the end of day the only aim is to create space in the hearts and minds of the kids. Also, each of these characters is aspirational. 

What is the TG that you look at for your shows?
We target two age brackets – 2-8 year olds and 9-14 year olds – for our shows. 

What are the key shifts seen in the kids’ genre today?

I think there are a couple of shifts that have happened in this category. We have seen the shift of international content taking a downswing and local content getting picked up. Also, if we look at it from a category perspective, it’s 50-50. But for most of the channels, it’s 90-10. If you look at Nick, Pogo, we have 80-90 per cent of local content and 10 per cent of international content. For Sonic, the local to international ratio is 65-35 and as we go along we are trying to narrow the gap. 

Another shift that I see is that we are moving to a different duration of content. Right from 60-second to 7-12 minute long episodes to a story which can be shown in 22 minutes to a 70-80 minute story. TV movies coming in have made a big difference in our FPC. We have movies on every weekend and during vacations it’s probably every day. Movies are a big shift for me. Moreover, there is less repetition of content as that age has gone where there used to be limited episodes and kids use to watch them repeatedly. Now, they are impatient and always look out for newness and variety. This newness is another shift. The last shift for me is the advertisers’ shift. The whole 50-50 angle of traditional versus non-traditional advertisers is becoming a big shift for us, where we are seeing categories like e-commerce, consumer durables and BFSI coming in. 

How much of live action do you have on your channel vis-à-vis animated content?
Zero. We have no live action shows. I don’t believe in investing in live action shows. There are two reasons for that: the first is that the fatigue factor sets in very fast. It has no repetition value. I need content that has shelf life. After a certain period of time, live action becomes a daily affair, and I don’t think the kids’ genre is a daily genre; every day there have to be new things. Secondly, live action cannot take the kids to an imaginary world. Therefore, I think we are never going to look at it as much. We have so much of live action happening outside the kids’ genre that kids can go and watch. 

What is the growth potential that you see in the kids’ genre?
I think there is a huge potential. There are 400 million kids in this country and the great thing about them is that they enter and exit that age group. So, every time you have new sets of kids that you have to entertain over the years. For me, one of the great potentials is in terms of volume. Secondly, there are in-house consultants where you have to ask them everything. They have a point of view on every single household decision and therefore, to me there is a huge potential for this category to grow. Advertisers are also looking at this potential and therefore we have some non-kids advertisers. 

While Nickelodeon has been a pioneer in creating some good local content, wasn’t it a huge risk to primarily go for local IPs?
Risk along with strategy is a good combination. Risk without any strategies is useless for me. Today, we are one of the few who have everything in-house – be it music, GEC, kids or English entertainment – and if we have to continue this, then we have to make sure that we make inroads. As an organisation, if you feel that there is a potential then you should have a kickass team and a strategy. If you have a strategy in mind, then take the risk to pursue it. Also, along with the strategy, you need to always have a Plan B ready. It’s very important that you evaluate Plan B before you take the risk. 

Every failure is a learning. For me, innovations are risks. It’s all about doing something which has not being done before by anybody. If you’re not going to take that risk, you will never innovate. 

In my personal life, too, I have taken enough risks in the past, where I have been in categories where I really didn’t know what I was doing. I jumped from advertising to FMCG to telecom and then finally media. 

However, more than the risks, I think it’s the great learnings that we get which matters.

For More Stories Visit Here.