The idea behind the launch of this channel is to bring curious minds of all ages together for learning in an entertaining manner. Da Vinci Learning is for the entire family and will offer knowledge, science and documentaries-based programmes for the Indian audience. The channel also aims to offer safe and quality-based entertainment for the entire family.
IndiaMediaBook gets in conversation with Mohit Anand, Managing Director Da Vinci Media India, to understand its strategies for Indian market.
What are some of the emerging trends that you foresee in Indian media industry?
Today technology is forcing the players of media and entertainment industry to look at alternative business models and delivery platforms. It’s the era of multiple screens, and delivering content to these multiple screens is unique and an exciting challenge, which the industry is currently facing.
There was a time, when TV screen was the only screen. But today, TV screen is definitely one screen, but not the only screen. There are screens of mobile, tablets, computers, Laptops, where people are consuming the content, or we can say its a delivery platform. TV screen is not going anywhere; the delivery to that TV screen may change from tradition medium to the modern Set-Top Box technology.
There was a time when we had Doordarshan via antenna on top of our houses and that changed in 90s and the decades of 2000, when cable TV entered and after that digitalisation is changing the whole experience of watching TV. Today OTT players are coming in the market. Thus, TV screens are not going anywhere; they will remain important at the centre of the consumer consumption of content.
That doesn’t mean that you can ignore the other screens. Other screens are equally important. So, for us seamlessly being able to deliver the content to our viewer across the screen of their choice, whether they are at home or on the move is what we are focused on.
What are the key challenges that Da Vinci is facing in the Indian market?
We have just launched 8 weeks ago, thus it is too early to say about what are the key challenges. It’s the beginning of a very exciting journey for us and India is a diverse, unique and a very large marketplace. We have long term plans for Indian market with our unique product which is perhaps unbridled in the market.
We combine knowledge programming in a fun and interactive manner for young children. Today if you look at some successful big brands in this space, their content such as surviving in the wild, sharks, wild life, great buildings etc. is more for adults. A six year old child can’t consume such content.
However, there is no such content available which is created and present in such a manner, that 6-12 year old children can understand it and have fun with it. We oscillate between the pure educational extension of a classroom in content which is relevant to the curriculum and on the other end of the spectrum, just goes to complete entertainment fun content which has no knowledge or learning value in it. Thus, that’s the gap Da Vinci is aiming to fulfil.
India is the land of many languages; it’s an advantage or a barrier? Do you have plans to produce content in different languages?
I think it’s both and Da Vinci looks at it from a different perspective. If you see Kids today, irrespective of the language they speak at home, be its Tamil, Marathi, Gujarati or any of the regional languages. When they go to school, they don’t study topics of Mathematics and Science in vernaculars.
Yes, there are topics such as languages, art or where there is a definite advantage in local medium, but in topics such as solar system, Mars will remain Mars, whatever the language is.
We feel that, for our current audience and the topics which we cover, a large part of that communication medium is English, Therefore, currently Da Vinci is available in English, but we are absolutely open to localizing the languages dependent on consumer need and desire.
Current we have channels in 17 languages across the globe, including the language Macedonia. If we can do a language version of Macedonia, whose total population is just few millions; we sure can do a language version for Indian market.
There are definite advantages in certain topics, where you might want to use vernaculars but at the same time there are certain topics that need to be in English, because that’s the medium of learning.
How difficult it is to conceptualise any program for Kids genre? What content strategies you are opting for Indian market?
Da Vinci is a very young company. It’s just an 8 years old brand globally and the entire DNA of the people who run Da Vinci across the world and senior managements are focused on the gaps which I have mentioned above.
Today 6-12 years children are curious and they want to understand, why things happen around them in a particular way. We as parents, relatives and guardian have may be studied all these in schools, but forgotten about these.
Secondly with the increase in stressed lifestyle that families lead in major cities, where parents perhaps feel guilty about not been able to spend enough quality time with their children, defaulting to the fact that they end up watching TV. Giving them that comfort that here is the content that is safe, fun, interactive and at the same time it hikes curiosity in a child. Da Vinci is serving across 130 countries across the globe and around 20 million subscribers around the world.
The leading broadcasters are also offering the edutainment. What are your plans to deal with the tough competition?
We have a unique positioning. I don’t see like products that exist in the marketplace which compares to Da Vinci Learning.
Today, there are lots of channels in kids’ genre offering fun and entertaining content, but even though its targeting the kids, the context is quite adult. There is lack of education fun content for kids; however, there are many infotainment channels that have great programming related to general knowledge, but those are targeting only adults.
What are your marketing strategies to take Da Vinci to its TG? Please share your digital mix.
Our objective is to reach out to the consumer and get our content to be viewed by a wide section of viewers. We also believe that, since we are an interactive product, we want to build a community of passionate endorsers.
So, a lot of our marketing is more dedicated on direct consumer context touch points. Whether we do via activation in schools during parents-teachers meeting day or we do it at a high consumer footfall location, or whether we interact with our consumer through social media platform or get in touch with consumers through our soon to be launched OTT play.
We are trying to have a direct consumer touch so that we can understand what our consumer feedback is
How has been your journey so far in India? Which is your biggest market?
It’s been an exciting journey but it’s just begun and like I said earlier that we are here for the long term and committed to the market. It is a very large and exciting but yet a challenging market. We are on that journey, where there is no end, as this journey will keep evolving.
We are here for a long term and we want to make sure that our content is consumed and sampled by as a wide section of viewers as possible. We are talking to parents, to analyse what kind of content kids are consuming these days on TV/internet, so that we can offer much better clean safe, non-violent option and at the same time it’s fun, interactive and imparts learning to the child.
Please share your views on association with Quintillion Media.
Di Vinci Learning India is co-owned by Da Vinci and The Quintillion Media. It already got a very strong partnership, where we have a very strong name of media industry who is backing up. So, we are thrilled with the partnership and it’s a perfect partnership and it added tremendous value to Da Vinci business in India.
How many users are consuming Da Vinci at the moment? What is your growth strategy for the Indian market? Are there any big plans for Da Vinci India?
Currently Da Vinci is reaching to 5 million households including non-tier I areas as well through Hathway and we are planning to expand its distribution reach. We are going to announce our distribution expansion to various leading operators.
Our strategy is to make this a sticky brand and we want to become the core standard, to speak from kids educational content on TV and on other non-linear platform and also to be the number one player in the kids edutainment space. We are working on our OTT play, through which we will able to deliver content on mobile screens and tablets etc.
