MAM
Music streaming app Gaana reaches 150 million monthly active users
MUMBAI: India’s largest music streaming app, Gaana crossed 150 million monthly active users in December 2019, making it the country’s first music streaming app to have crossed the mighty mark. This staggering leap to 150 million, buoyed by 40 per cent growth in regional music consumption and 35 percent growth in Bollywood music consumption in the past year has consolidated the brand’s strong hold as a market leader in the country’s audio OTT market.
Over the past year, Gaana has launched several industry-first features like being the first music app to introduce in-app voice assistant, introducing sing-along lyrics on the player page, Gaana video, Instant app experience or smart downloads, where the app automatically downloads a premium user’s favorite tracks based on their listening history to deliver substantial value to the digital music experience of users across India. Additionally, Gaana’s AI and machine learning-led recommendations manifested by AutoQueue and ‘For You’ sections now power more than 23 percent of consumption. These innovations combined with Gaana’s vast 45 million songs-strong music library across Bollywood, International and 30 Indic languages and it's newly launched 3000 strong podcast library including its promising ‘Gaana Podcast Originals’ featuring youth icons hold great promise for sustained organic growth in 2020.
Gaana CEO Prashan Agarwal said, "At Gaana, we believe in being the music companion to our users by adding melody and meaning to their everyday lives. Touching the 150 million users milestone is a testimony to the efforts of our incredible team and our vision to bring the most intuitive and immersive musical experience to our users. This achievement will offer us a stronger motivation to leverage our proprietary AI-driven algorithms and newly launched features in newer ways at greater scale to enable the next generation of music-lovers to discover our unending collection of songs and offer them a more immersive and fulfilling experience.”
The Indian music streaming industry is at the cusp of an incredible growth curve as more of us start consuming music online. The sector has seen a meteoric 3X growth in the past two years, and the market is expected to 400 Million monthly active users in the next two years. As the country’s go-to music app streaming over three and a half billion songs every month, more than some of its competitors combined, Gaana’s new feat has cemented its reputation as a pioneer in bringing product and UI innovation into the country’s music streaming sector with a strong focus on the Indian music lover.
Brands
UltraTech Cement appoints Jayant Dua as managing director
Dua will succeed K. C. Jhanwar after his term ends in December 2026
MUMBAI: UltraTech Cement, the flagship cement arm of the Aditya Birla Group, has elevated Jayant Dua as managing director, effective 1 April, 2026.
The company’s board also approved his appointment as additional director, managing director and key managerial personnel, effective 1 January, 2027, following the completion of the current managing director K C Jhanwar’s term on 31 December, 2026, according to a regulatory filing.
Dua will serve as managing director for a four-year term from 1 January, 2027 to 31 December, 2030.
A veteran executive with more than 37 years of professional experience, Dua joined the Aditya Birla Group’s cement business in 1996 and spent nearly a decade in various functional and leadership roles.
Over the past two decades, he has held several profit-and-loss and chief executive responsibilities across multiple group businesses, including insulators, insurance, Century Cement and the chlor-alkali segment. In 2023, he was elevated to lead the group’s renewables and textiles businesses.
Within the group, Dua has received several internal honours, including the chairman’s individual award for exceptional contribution in 2002, the outstanding leader award in 2009 and the leader of leaders recognition in 2022.
He holds an engineering degree from Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, an MBA from International Management Institute and has completed the advanced management programme at Harvard Business School.
