North lags behind south, west in cable viewership  ( July '14,2001, ET)

NORTH India has fallen behind in the cable viewership. And therefore, it’s no surprise that the region is not the most favoured bastion for Indian television broadcasting companies or cable television service providers, better known as multi-service operators.

Southern and Western regions, however, continue to dominate as far as cable and satellite households are concerned.

According to Indian Readership Survey, channels cutting across genres are finding the northern belt a hard nut to crack. Be it entertainment, natural history, movies, sports or the news channel blocks, the northern market has been marred by low C&S home penetration compared to the southern and western regions.

And if the industry mandarins are to be believed then this shortfall is the genesis for north India’s thin slice in the total revenue pie of channels.

According to industry sources, in terms of north India’s share in total revenues of channels, most channels targeting a nationwide audience are in the 10-20 per cent bracket.

However, for channels like ESPN and Star Sports, the northern region is contributing a 20-15 per cent share to their total revenues kitty.

If the figures are anything to go by then as per the IRS data for 2000-2001, Southern India dominates the market shares on most of the parameters including cable and satellite home penetration.

The penetration ultimately decides the reach, paid connectivity, advertising revenues and the total revenue collections of the channels.

The latest figures indicate that 60-odd channels have garnered a 22 per cent penetration in North India which accounts for roughly 6 million C&S homes and 30 million viewing suscribers. Where as, South India accounts for a near 40 per cent of the total C&S homes in the country.

The western belt with just two states (Maharashtra and Gujarat) and a close to 22 per cent market share is closing in on the hold of north Indian states.

Collectively, the south and the western regions have 18 million of the 30 million C&S homes in the country.

The channel wise statistics for all flagship channels in the northern region for 2000-2001 reveals that the DD driver channels, DD1 and DD Metro penetrate a respective 5.3 million and 4.1 million C & S homes.

Star’s driver channel, Star Plus has it’s presence in 3.2 million homes. Zee Telefilm’s Zee Tv has penetrated nearly 5.2 million homes in the northern region. Sony’s flagship general entertainment channel, Sony TV has presence in 5 million C & S households.

In the natural history channel block, Discovery network’s Discovery channel beams into 1.5-2 million homes whereas, National Geographic has penetrated .4 million homes. In the news channel block, Zee News has captured 4 million homes where as, Star News has it’s presence in 2.5 million C & S homes.

In the sports genre, Star Sports has penetrated 3.2 million satellite homes and ESPN has found presence in 2.4 million homes. Turner International’s Cartoon Network, the lone stand alone toon channel in the cartoon category has penetrated 2 million households in the northern states.

In the movie category, while figures for HBO could not be ascertained, sources said that HBO has seen higher penetration in the southern and western India states.

Star Movies on he other hand has been able to penetrate 2.8 million satellite in the northern market. On the national scene, however, HBO seems to have overtaken Star Movies. Compared to Star Movies’s 14 million penetration, HBO has cornered 17 million C & S homes.

Hindi movies on the contrary is perhaps the lone domain where north market scores over the other regions. Zee Cinema beams into roughly 4 million homes in the north and has 4.5 million paying subscribers nationwide.