Voot, the video-on-demand streaming platform of Viacom18, is now focusing to grow its base in Kannada language after finding success in Hindi in the past years.
To acquire a large segment of Kannada viewers, Voot has lined up a series of programmes which will be unveiled soon, a top executive said.
On Monday, it announced that the first season of the digital edition of Bigg Boss OTT Kannada would be streamed starting August 6, 2022, and Kichcha Sudeep will be its host. This follows the success of Voot’s reality show Bigg Boss OTT Hindi last year.
“Kannada is their next strongest market where television is concerned. Since January 2022, we have been very aggressive in the Kannada market. We have attained leadership position within the first six months in the Kannada market for OTT,” said Ferzad Palia, head of SVOD and International Business, Viacom18.
“We have had remarkable performance given that our competitors have been in the market for a long time. Seeing this success in this market, we decided to double down on our Kannada content,” he added.
He said Voot would premiere a new film in Kannada every Friday on OTT.
On Bigg Boss OTT Kannada, he said, “The season will be available for viewers to watch live 24 hours just like the Hindi season. We have a lot of interactivities planned.”
The show will run for six weeks. The names of the participants would be announced soon.
Mr. Palia said that non-fiction content and movies would continue to be Voot’s focus for the Kannada market. The platform is also in the process of making original series exclusive to OTT which it would announce soon.
Speaking on Voot’s plans for southern markets Mr. Palia said, “We are not in a hurry. Just like we have our learnings in Hindi, we want to get our learning in Kannada. We have a lot of work going on for the other languages and markets as well.”
“We want to be a clear and dominant player in the Kannada market in the digital space. We want to bring in new experiences as that is what viewers want,” he added.
