MAM
HBO lines up Bond festival, launches biggest marketing campaign
MUMBAI: HBO, which has lost market share in the English movie channel space, has packed 21 Bond films and has kicked off its biggest marketing campaign for the festive season.
The movies, dubbed under the “HBOO7” initiative, will air Monday-Friday ‘after the 9 pm movie‘ slot.
As Star Movies had shown the Bond festival earlier in the year, HBO is trying to connect the property to the viewers‘ through a differentiated promotional strategy. The channel‘s identity has been fused to the property.
Said HBO South Asia country manager Shruti Bajpai, “This is the biggest marketing campaign in the channel‘s history. The levels of innovation are higher compared to our previous campaigns. We are using our own Bond women for the campaign that covers on-air, OOH, digital, print etc. We have created a site HBOO7.com that offers fans everything they want to know about Bond. There is also a desktop widget that fans can download. We are offering games where, among other things, people can dress up Bond women.”
A contest is being run on-air where fans can win Omega watches, ipads etc. The ads have been created using three themes – Bond and women, Bond and gadgets and Bond and villains. “This creates more focus and is different from just airing TVCs,” Bajpai said.
On the OOH front, the channel has taken billboards. In some of them, the cutout of a Bond woman is used to give a 3D impression.
Apart from the Bond festival the channel is also doing a ‘Diwali Platinum‘ initiative at 9 pm where blockbusters are shown. The ‘Diwali Gold‘ initiative at noon offers fun and family-oriented films.
On Sundays, there is a “Heroes versus Villains” initiative where films are shown back to back at 9 pm and 11 pm. The theme is that of good triumphing over evil.
On the ad front, Bajpai said that in keeping with the Bond festival poker sets have been sent to agencies.
Tata Manza and Sony Bravia are the main sponsors for the HBOO7 initiative. Other sponsors include Phillips and Micromax.
Digital
Content India 2026 opens with a copro pitch, a spice evangelist and a £10,000 prize for Indian storytelling
Dish TV and C21Media’s three-day summit puts seven ambitious projects before an international jury, and two walk away with serious development money
MUMBAI: India’s content industry gathered in Mumbai this March for Content India 2026, a three-day summit organised by Dish TV in partnership with C21Media, and it wasted no time making a statement. The event opened with a Copro Pitch that put seven scripted and unscripted television concepts before an international panel of judges, and by the end of it, two projects had walked away with £10,000 each in marketing prize money from C21Media to support development and international promotion.
The jury, comprising Frank Spotnitz, Fiona Campbell, Rashmi Bajpai, Bal Samra and Rachel Glaister, evaluated a shortlist that ranged from a dark Mumbai comedy-drama about mental health (Dirty Minds, created by Sundar Aaron) to a Delhi coming-of-age mystery (Djinn Patrol, by Neha Sharma and Kilian Irwin), a techno-thriller about a teenage gaming prodigy (Kanpur X Satori, by Suchita Bhatia), an investigative crime drama blending mythology and modern thriller (The Age of Kali, by Shivani Bhatija), a documentary on India’s spice heritage (The Masala Quest, hosted by Sarina Kamini), a documentary on competitive gaming (Respawn: India’s Esports Revolution, by George Mangala Thomas and Sangram Mawari), and a reality-horror competition merging gaming and immersive fear (Scary Goose, by Samar Iqbal).
The session was hosted by Mayank Shekhar.
The two winners were Djinn Patrol, backed by Miura Kite, formerly of Participant Media and known for Chinatown and Keep Sweet: Pray & Obey, with Jaya Entertainment, producers of Real Kashmir Football Club, also attached; and The Masala Quest, created and hosted by Sarina Kamini, an Indian-Australian cook, author and self-described “spice evangelist.”
The summit also unveiled the Content India Trends Report, whose findings made for bracing reading. Daoud Jackson, senior analyst at OMDIA, set the tone: “By 2030, online video in India will nearly double the revenue of traditional TV, becoming the main driver of growth.” He noted that in 2025, India produced a quarter of all YouTube videos globally, overtaking the United States, while Indians collectively spend 117 years daily on YouTube and 72 years on Instagram. Traditional subscription TV is declining as free TV and connected TV gain ground, forcing broadcasters to innovate. “AI-generated content is just 2 per cent of engagement,” Jackson added, “highlighting the dominance of high-quality human content. The key for Indian media companies is scaling while monetising effectively from day one.”
Hannah Walsh, principal analyst at Ampere Analysis, added hard numbers to the picture. India produced over 24,000 titles in January 2026 alone, with 19,000 available internationally. The country now accounts for 12 per cent of Asia-Pacific content spend, up from 8 per cent in 2021, outpacing both Japan and China. Key exporters include JioStar, Zee Entertainment, Sony India, Amazon and Netflix, delivering over 7,500 Indian-produced titles abroad each year. The top importing markets are Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, the United States and the Philippines. Scripted content dominates globally at 88 per cent, with crime dramas and children’s and family titles performing particularly strongly.
Manoj Dobhal, chief executive and executive director of Dish TV India, framed the summit’s ambition squarely. “Stories don’t need translation. They need a platform, discovery, and reach, local or global,” he said. “India produces more movies than any country, our streaming platforms compete globally, and our tech and creators win international awards. Yet fragmentation slows growth. Producers, platforms, and tech move in different lanes. We need shared spaces, collaboration, and an ecosystem where ideas, technology, and people meet. That is why we built Content India.”
The data, the pitches and the prize money all pointed to the same conclusion: India is not waiting for the world to discover its stories. It is building the infrastructure to sell them.
