Mumbai: Dwibhashyam was speaking at Indiantelevision.com’s annual industry event, The Content Hub in Mumbai on Tuesday, in conversation with Associate Editor, Kalpana Ravi. The conversation was around documentaries are and how DocuBay, today, caters to the English speaking audiences and acquiring international content, Dwibhashyam said,
“We have a catalogue of international documentaries, which has been acquired and curated from all over the world from some of the leading factual entertainment creators. The platform has been here for the last four years, working hard on the product and content curation. Today, we are looking at an app, which is the go to destination for international documentaries in India, and among the very few internationally, to cater to the segment. I can confidently say that we own the space in India, and we own a large chunk of documentary viewership around the world as a dedicated platform for international documentaries."
Ravi goes on to ask, when it comes to documentaries, which is very huge internationally, what is the kind of audience in India are attracted towards documentaries, Dwibhashyam goes on to say, “In India, we have around 690 million internet users, in general, if we consider the 1.4 billion population, it is estimated that 250 million people who speak English or understand English. So if we do the math, then out of 690 million, and we are looking at 250 million internet speaking or understanding individuals within India, so we are looking at 35 to 40 per cent of Internet users who understand English language, and that is the kind of addressable audience we are looking at. So hence, we believe that documentaries are very much mainstream, and till now, they have been, funnelled into a very narrow pipe of broadcast. But now because of internet, things are opened up. I think the biggest testimony for how popular factual entertainment is, if you look at some of the top five content creators on YouTube, almost three to four out of the top five are non-fiction content creators. That's the kind of demand we are looking at and we cater to the non-fiction space and documentary which in one form in which we are offering factual entertainment.”
“Presently as of now we are sticking to English language, but we are not ruling out on dubbing these documentaries in other languages as well. So definitely, that's something that's on the cards, but as I said, the addressable market for us, even with the current content that we have, is quite deep and, the biggest example for that is the kind of numbers we are seeing on our D2C platform and with our partners, which include some of the leading Telco’s and aggregator platforms as well. So considering that eyeballs I think, I think we have just started the journey. I think language is definitely something which we will think about soon,” Dwibhashyam said.
Asked by Ravi if they would invest money in producing home-grown documentaries in India. I think there are enough filmmakers here who will be interested in your answer. Dwibhashyam, went on and said, "Definitely, I think that's a natural progression for an OTT to start with acquire content and then go on to create its own original content, that's exactly what we are doing. As we speak, we have already green lit multiple projects and some of the projects are on floor and in the next couple of months, we'll start seeing almost monthly releases of our original documentaries, these documentaries will be a reflection of the brand DocuBay and what the brand stands for. These documentaries are an opportunity for us to kind of exploit the learnings that we've had with respect to what users are watching on our platform all these years. Presently, a lot of research is being done as we speak. So I think what we are expecting to see something that that we hope to be proud of."
On the question of is the rise in documentary viewing increased during the past three years, and is it due to viewer fatigue by Ravi, Dwibhashyam said, "Yes you hit the nail on the head. Today if you're talking about web series, almost every OTT is churning out a new series on fictions, every single week and there's a lot happening within the fiction space. But I think that there is a fatigue among the viewer, especially over the last two, three years since the pandemic started, where they're now exposed to so much of the same stuff, that they want to try out something new, they want to watch something different. Today, Indians are more knowledgeable, and a much more knowledge seeking Indian, they care about what's happening in the world. Everyone is voicing their opinion on social media and aware as to what's happening in the moment. Documentaries cater to this curious mind. We are just at the right space at the right time. Not too early, not too late. But I think there is a wave happening."
