ZEE5 unveils slate of 100 plus titles

New Delhi: ZEE5, the video streaming platform owned by Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd, has unveiled a slate of 111 subscription-driven titles to be released over the next 12 months. These will be produced in collaboration with companies such as Dharma Productions, Salman Khan Films, Guneet Monga’s Sikhya Entertainment, Bhanushali Studios, The Viral Fever (TVF), Goldie Behl’s Rose Audio Visuals, Applause Entertainment, Sudhir Mishra, Vikas Bahl, Vivek Agnihotri, and Nagraj Manjule, among others. The platform had released over 90 titles last year too, a senior executive said.

“Our slate works backwards from what the consumer is looking for and targets all age and income groups. We see Indians ready to view content in their own language,” Manish Kalra, chief business officer, ZEE5 India said in an interview.

He said the slate is a healthy mix of original series as well as films acquired for direct-to-digital release and post-theatrical showcasing.

The past few months have seen theatrical titles such as RRR and The Kashmir Files along with direct-to-digital movies like Mrs. Undercover and U-Turn debut on the service. While not achieving the kind of growth seen during the pandemic, Kalra said the platform ended 2022 with 119 million monthly active users globally (across AVoD and SVoD offerings) with double-digit growth in subscription and revenue.

The new slate includes series and movies across Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Bangla, Punjabi and Marathi languages.

The line-up features sequels of original series including Sunflower season two, Taj: Reign of Revenge, TVF’s Humorously Yours season three and Aam Aadmi Family season four, The Kashmir Files Unreported, Duranga season two, Mithya season two, The Broken News season two, Guneet Monga’s Gyarah Gyarah (11:11), Sudhir Mishra’s Crime Beat, direct-to-digital movies Manoj Bajpayee’s Sirf Ek Bandaa Kaafi Hai and Silence 2, Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s Haddi and Love is Blind, Pankaj Tripathi’s Kadak Singh and Huma Qureshi’s Tarla. Besides, the platform will also stream Sunny Deol’s Gadar 2 post its theatrical release; and regional titles like Vetrimaaran and Vijay Sethupathi’s Viduthalai - Part 1, Arya's Kathar Basha Endra Muthuramalingam and Nagraj Manjule’s Ghar Banduk Biryani.

Nimisha Pandey, chief content officer, Hindi originals, ZEE5 said it is now easy to see that content travels across metros and tier-two and tier-three towns. “We can see audiences reward us when we take risks,” Pandey said.

The announcement has come at a time when global video streaming platforms are cutting content spend in India, as muted subscriber growth piles on revenue pressure. In 2018, these players started spending heavily on content to grab eyeballs and spending was later spurred by the covid-19 lockdown. However, many producers now feel that the gravy train has stopped. “The industry is still in a nascent stage and all of us are trying to be more efficient and drive growth even as we attempt optimisation of costs,” Kalra said declining to comment on the company’s investment details but adding that it could run into ‘millions of dollars.’