INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
MUMBAI: Subhash Chandra promoted Zee Entertainment Enterprises (ZEE) and Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Jio have initiated talks to break a
on August 9 that ZEE has removed all its content from Reliance Jio, including 35 live TV channels and more than 200,000 hours of
video-on-demand content, after the two companies failed to agree on content pricing.
Last weekend, the promoters of the two companies
decided to sort out the matter and talks are on to get ZEE content back on Jio this week, the persons cited earlier told ET, requesting not
to be named.
Email queries sent to ZEE and Reliance Jio remained unanswered till as of press time on Monday, but an executive of Reliance
before Thursday.
On August 6, the management of ZEE had decided to withdraw all content from Reliance Jio Digital Services, terminating a
subscribers via the Jio Cinema mobile application.
Incidentally, within a week of snapping ties with Jio, ZEE announced a three-year
multi-layered deal with rival telecom player Bharti Airtel, where the two companies decided to work closely on creating exclusive video
what helped seal the deal was the fact that Airtel agreed to share consumer insights and data of the users with ZEE as part of the
deal.
Punit Goenka, managing director of ZEE, had told ET in an interaction after the announcement that consumer data was critical for a
long-term partnership and it was one of the key negotiation points for the Airtel deal
He had also mentioned that ZEE was not getting fair value for its content in the existing deal with Jio, while maintaining that the exit
I would love to offer our content on Jio, provided we get a fair value
commercial launch, Jio has grown to have over 215 million subscribers, and with many of the subscribers consuming live TV on their phones,
broadcasters are looking at renegotiating their deals, seeking better commercial arrangements.
