| Two
months back, Neo Sports decided to independently
distribute its TV channels after terminating
their distribution arrangement with Star India.
On
the cable front, Neo Sports is on an aggressive
distribution ramp up for the forthcoming
October India-Australia ODI series.
Kalathil
said that Neo Sports had already signed
cable distribution deals in major cities
in North, Central and parts of West India.
These include Delhi, Gurgaon, Chandigarh,
Lucknow, Camper, Jaipur, Bhopal, Indore,
Mumbai, Ahmedabad and Baroda.
Kalathil
said, "Traditionally broadcasters have
been very advertising focused and have played
for high stakes in the metros such as Delhi
and Mumbai and advertising critical centres
such as Gurgaon, where most of the media
agencies have offices. Our approach has
been different. In
Phase-1 we went to the traditionally less
penetrated states such as MP, UP and Rajasthan.
It is incidental that while doing so we
are now 100 per cent lit in Gurgaon and
the large cities of Gujarat too. This is
Phase-1 of our rollout strategy."
Kalathil
went on to further clarify that in phase-two
of the rollout by the end of the first week
of September, Neo would cover platforms
such as DTH and some of the major MSOs.
The
third phase of the rollout by mid September
would cover much of the South, another traditionally
less focussed region for national broadcasters.
"This is critical to our multi language
cricket broadcast strategy" he added.
The
final part of the roll out would be in the
large metros and would be complete by middle
of September, in time to catch the October
India - Australia ODI series.
|
