ZEEL to offer multiple packs across languages

Leading television broadcaster Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL) is planning to launch multiple bouquets catering to consumers of different languages across India. This is being done in line with the August 31, 2018, deadline set by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) for announcing the maximum retail price (MRP) for television channels by various broadcasters under the new MRP regime.

Accordingly, all Zee channels are likely to be made available on a-la-carte basis, as required by the regulations. Consumers could also have the option to choose from specifically-created bouquets for Hindi-speaking markets (HSM) and different regional language markets (Marathi, Bangla, Odia, Bhojpuri, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada & Malayalam).

For each market, there will be multiple bouquets available to consumers across the country at different price points. Each bouquet would constitute a mix of channels of different genres including general entertainment, movies, news, infotainment and music. The starting bouquet (B1) is likely to exclude English entertainment and English movie channels whereas the premium bouquet would include all channels offered by Zee, said company sources.

ZEEL is likely to keep the prices of Hindi language bouquets starting Rs 45. For other languages, bouquet prices could be higher in those markets where Zee has multiple offerings and lower in other cases.

"For high definition (HD) consumers, Zee is working on additional bouquets which will make it convenient for various operators to offer to their respective subscribers. The Hindi language HD bouquets are likely to be priced Rs 60 upwards, sources said.

ZEEL is also likely to offer all its news channels along with its other popular channels like Zee Anmol, Big Ganga and Big Magic as part of these pay bouquets. "As a result, these channels would not be available in the free to air (FTA) pack, sources said.