The market equations

The easy availability of dubbing vendors is actually de-activating the boom effect in terms of money. The theory "more work and so more money" doesn't really apply here. The congestion has eventually brought down the rates.

"The competition is taking rates down. A lot of undercutting is happening in the industry," points out Sound & Vision president Leela Roy Ghosh.

Industry experts opine that, even in this fragmented scenario, bigger players are not looking at consolidation by acquiring smaller players because they have their hands full.

En Sync's Saksena

"They are not threatened by the smaller players at all. They take bulk of the deals happening. Big networks prefer corporate level players like UTV. The small players make it big by improving their standards or just disappear in the long run," says Saksena.

Returns from a dubbing assignment depend on various factors including number of character and number of episodes. Rates differ from channel to channel and it also depends on the budget allocated. "The cost differs from project to project based on the kind of execution," says Leela Roy Ghosh.

The rates

Industry estimates put the dubbing cost for a one hour TV programme in the range of Rs. 45,000 and Rs. 55,000. Dubbing cost of TV movies ranges from Rs. 75,000 to Rs. 1,00,000. VCD/DVD dubbing of English movies to Hindi costs up to Rs 1,00,000 while the dubbing cost of an English movie for theatre stands in the region of Rs. 3,50,000 to Rs. 6,00,000.

UTV's dubbing studio

Ghosh finds the pricing levels of both episode dubbing and film dubbing equally lucrative. The ratio UTV recorded between episode dubbing and film dubbing in the last fiscal was 65:35. Ghosh says there is an increase in episode assignments.

"Episodes have gone up. This is because volume of broadcasting work went up," he says.

VGP's D'costa prefers episodes to films. "Work from serials is consistent. Films are sporadic," he says.

According to industry analysts, the charges get reduced up to 50 per cent when broadcasters get into bulk deals with dubbing vendors. But in the case of movies, bulk deals happen very rarely.

"A channel may be acquiring 50 Hollywood movies a year, but it won't know what title is reaching them in what time. So channels can't commit," says Saksena whose En Sync has Star Gold in its clientele.

Saksena feels the channels hold an edge in the bargain game. "Some occasions, they won't be ready to pay more than Rs. 1,00,000 even if it is a one hour movie or a two and a half hours movie. Normally vendors don't bargain much. If you can prove your worth by excelling your job, you can demand a premium of up to 15 per cent," he says.

While Sun TV and Vijay TV get their Hollywood flicks dubbed from dubbing vendors, Jaya TV directly acquires dubbed versions of Hollywood movies from agents.

"We buy it in bulk, about 30 movies at a time. This saves time and cost," says business head Balaswaminathan.