JioStar, the media and entertainment arm of Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), says it is deliberately backing stories that extend beyond India's major metros to resonate with audiences across diverse sub-cultures and economic segments, acknowledging that a one-size-fits-all approach does not work in a country of this scale.
A senior executive said the company is taking a selective, considered approach to greenlighting content across films (Star Studio18), linear television (including general entertainment channels like Colors and Star Plus) and streaming (JioHotstar), with a strong focus on profitability as viewers turn increasingly screen-agnostic and the lines between TV and OTT continue to blur.
“A higher level of thoughtfulness and selectiveness has come into the picture, along with a focus on profitability. There was a time in the industry, five to six years ago, when we were expanding the market and wanted to see what would work. We now have a strong view on what we want to do and are looking closely at how to make it profitable over a period of time,” Alok Jain, head-Hindi and English entertainment business (streaming, TV and studios), JioStar, said in an interview to Mint.
Acquisition costs
While the company backs a mix of small and high-profile shows such as Chiraiya and Pritam and Pedro for JioHotstar, Jain noted that film acquisition costs for OTT platforms have seen a sharp correction.
Riding on the success of Chiraiya, the tenth most-watched OTT property in the first six months of 2026, according to Ormax, the platform now plans to strengthen its regional language slate with Bhojpuri Bawaal, a Bhojpuri reality show.
Six other reality shows, including Koffee With Karan, Bigg Boss and Khatron Ke Khiladi, are slated to launch across TV and OTT within the next four months. Meanwhile, on the studio side, while the company benefits from the distribution of Hollywood titles, it is also releasing Ajay Devgn’s Drishyam 3 later in the year.
JioStar, formed by the merger of Reliance's Viacom18 and The Walt Disney Co.'s Disney Star, reported a 14.5% year-on-year increase in net profit to ₹665 crore in the June quarter.
To be sure, these moves come at a time when the Indian OTT industry is struggling with content clutter as well as limited ad and subscription revenues. Major platforms have slashed budgets by 50% since the peak of the pandemic and active paid subscriptions have flattened as user growth leans more towards ad-supported models than paid tiers. Meanwhile, heavy investments in original long-form content have failed to translate into significant subscriber growth.
Blurring the lines
Beyond programming for 'many Indias,' given the country’s young, large and culturally diverse population, Jain said the big focus post-merger has been on blurring the lines between TV and digital platforms. To build on that strategy, recent shows such as Bareilly Ke Bacchan and Mahadev & Sons have been deliberately set in small towns. Meanwhile, along with fiction, the company has a large slate of non-fiction properties slated for release over the next few months across TV and digital. These include titles like Hustle, Bigg Boss Hindi, Dhamaal with Pati Patni Aur Panga, India Ke Top 1%, Laughter Chefs, Roadies, Splitsvilla and The 50.
“We do not see India as one homogeneous culture. India has a lot of Indias within it, and it's important that we look at these smaller cohorts deeply and programme for them,” Jain said, adding that even global content on JioHostar from Disney, Marvel and Peacock is dubbed into multiple local languages.
In film production, JioStar operates Star Studio18, which was created through the phased merger of UTV, Star Studios and Viacom18 Studios. Jain said the vertical functions at arm's length from the company's other businesses and can produce films independently for theatrical release or work with any platform in the country including rivals like Netflix, Prime Video and others. Other than distributing Hollywood titles like Avengers: Doomsday in the coming months, the studio will release the third instalment of the Drishyam franchise starring Ajay Devgn, besides a film called Chiranjeevi Hanuman: The Eternal.
In February 2024, billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s RIL and The Walt Disney Co. formed a joint venture combining the businesses of Reliance’s associate company, Viacom18 Media Pvt. Ltd, and Disney’s Star India. To be sure, industry experts say JioStar enjoys a strong market position. However, challenges persist across OTT platforms, particularly in digital advertising, where pricing is largely based on CPM (cost per mille, or cost per thousand impressions). This is a pricing model where the advertiser pays for every 1,000 impressions, or the number of times the ad is shown. The rates for OTT are very low in India because advertisers don't see a wide enough audience base. Plus, competing online platforms like social media and e-commerce are considered more viable for advertisers. Companies like JioStar are actively making efforts in AI and content commerce to improve monetization.
“Network strength always works and for a company like JioStar, their dominant position in the market along with scale will help the overall entity in the long run, especially when offerings are bundled along with properties like the IPL,” said Partho Dasgupta, managing partner of Thoth Advisors and former chief executive of BARC India.