To make live TV & VOD easier: Global Takeoff's Uday Reddy

Converged over the top (OTT) live TV and video on demand solutions are fast emerging the order of the day. As internet penetration In India increases and users utilize smart phones, tablets and other hand held devices for watching films and videos, providers of such services are in for good times. With more 227 million people using internet in India, and the country becoming a hub of Smart phones, a live TV has became a reality in India.

A leading OTT player in this segment is Global Takeoff Inc which through its platform Yupp TV delivers more than 150 Indian TV channels, more than 4500 videos (daily), movies, live events and a lot more. The content is delivered on various devices and screens for consumption i.e. connected TVs, internet STBs, Smart Bluray players, PCs, smart phones and tablets. The service currently has one of the industry’s highest content usages per subscriber.

The company’s mission is make it simple and instant for broadcasters to deliver live TV and VOD anytime and anywhere in the world to any internet enabled device. The company aims to make access to entertainment easier and faster than conventional entertainment media allows it to be.

Speaking to Adgully, on the prospects in the Indian market, Uday Reddy, CEO, Global Takeoff says, “For OTT services the market has a huge potential in long term. As internet is the basic necessity for watching Internet TV, we still don’t have any unlimited Internet data plans in India. Apart from metro cities we still have difficulty in finding high speed internet plans at affordable prices. Though usage of smart devices is increasing in India but it will take some time to achieve success due to these bandwidth limitations and unlimited bandwidth pricing plans.”

The company’s derives its revenue through subscription and advertising and its future plans are to acquire more subscribers, more content and expand in India. However there are challenges. Says Reddy, “as a start up, cash flow is always a challenge. We have been very cautious in our spending and expenses. Moreover, our team has been working passionately towards the goals to overcome these challenges. One of other challenges in this space is content acquisition and content cost. We try our best to maintain company cash flows trying to overcome these challenges.”

There is also another key question to be answered whether the Indian consumer is spending enough in a scenario where the average revenue per user (ARPU) is stagnant or going down? Replies Reddy, “I agree it's going down. However implementing interactive services over internet will generate incremental revenues over these legacy revenues.”