BackColors to roll out second Kannada GEC
The new channel, Colors Super, will be launched on 24 July
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New Delhi: Buoyed by success of its Kannada general entertainment channel Colors Kannada, which has been ruling the TV viewership charts in the genre for the past one year, Viacom18 Media Pvt. Ltd is gearing up to roll out another channel in the same genre titled Colors Super.
“We want to grow our viewership in Karnataka and we want to build another GEC (general entertainment channel) which is equally popular. We have genres and programmes which we are not able to put on the existing channel because we have a limitation of time (7-8 hours of original programming every day)," said Sudhanshu Vats, group chief executive officer, Viacom18 Media, adding that Colors currently owns 36% of the viewership share in Kannada GEC segment. The new channel will be launched on 24 July.
According to data released by television viewership measurement agency Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India on Thursday, Colors Kannada bagged the number one position among Kannada channels with a total of 292 million impressions between 25 June and 1 July.
Impressions refer to the number of individuals in thousands of a target audience who viewed an event, averaged across minutes.
“It has been a number one channel for a very long time and we have a strong lead over the competition," said Vats. Colors, the flagship brand of Viacom18, is currently present in five regional markets—Karnataka, Maharashtra, West Bengal, Gujarat and Odisha. The company’s Hindi entertainment channel Colors ranked number two after Star Plus among the top 10 channels across urban and rural markets in the latest BARC numbers on viewership.
Colors Super is the first GEC launch by Viacom18 in the Kannada market. The existing Kannada channel was acquired by Viacom18 from Hyderabad-based Eenadu Television —better known by its screen name ETV—and was later rechristened Colors Kannada.
Colors Kannada competes with Star India’s Suvarna, Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL)-owned Zee Kannada and Sun Network’s Udaya TV in the Kannada entertainment segment.
It’s easy to see why Viacom is launching a second channel in Kannada. According to estimates from broadcasters and media buyers, it is a significant ₹ 550 to ₹ 600 crore television advertising market, growing at roughly 12% a year. Vats, however, pegs the growth rate at 18%.
“Karnataka is emerging as an important regional market for the broadcasters and for the advertisers as well," said Rahul Jadhav, national trading head at the media agency MEC India, adding that Colors Kannada holds the largest share in Kannada market.
Little surprise then that Colors Super plans to offer 25-30 hours of original programming every week. “Kannada GEC is one of the fastest growing markets in all the regional space. We are deepening our presence in the market with Colors Super," said Vats.
Colors Super will offer different genres like family dramas, stories around social issues, youth-based romantic comedies and also mytho-historical and horror content—genres which have not been explored by Colors Kannada.
Viacom18 is not the only broadcaster that is looking to expand the Kannada language segment. Star India, which runs Suvarna, will soon introduce a ₹ 60 crore mythological television series Har Har Mahadev on its channel. It is one of the biggest investments made by a channel in the regional market. Star runs two channels in the Kannada market—Suvarna and Suvarna Plus, the latter being a sports channel. In the week ended 1 July, Suvarna was the fourth-most watched channel in Karnataka with 169 million impressions.
An executive from a Kannada language entertainment channel, who declined to be named, said the Kannada GEC market is growing at a healthy rate and is a darling of the advertisers. “We are also looking at big scale investments in our Kannada channel in near future," he added.
Sunil Buch, chief business officer, ZEEL, which runs a clutch of regional channels including Zee Kannada said that the broadcaster is focused on expanding its presence in the regional markets.
“We are a strong No.2 in the Kannada market and going ahead, we aim to further strengthen our position in the industry," said Buch. Zee Kannada registered 209 million impressions during the week ended 1 July.
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