News Broadcasting
NDTV achieves operational breakeven
MUMBAI: Dr Prannoy Roy’s New Delhi Television Ltd. (NDTV) has announced its results for the quarter ended 31 March 2004. The company achieved cash break even in the fourth quarter in its first year of operation as a broadcaster.
The turnaround in the fourth quarter took place after losses in the first three quarters, a company release states. NDTV’s EBIDTA. (earnings before interest, depreciation and tax) in the fourth quarter amounted to a positive Rs 17.5 million, it said.
The breakeven was achieved with a sharp increase in income from advertisers. NDTV’s income for the fourth quarter amounted to Rs 239.8 million, compared to an income of Rs 341.4 million for the earlier nine months. (Average quarterly income reported during the first nine months works out to Rs 113.8 million.)
The company’s loss for the first three quarters was reported at Rs 473.8 million. This increased in the fourth quarter by a small amount provided for depreciation of Rs 26.1 million. For the full year, on a consolidated basis, NDTV has reported an income of Rs 689.8 million and a net loss of Rs 496.2 million, says the release.
The company recently came out with an IPO of 15.57 million equity shares of Rs 4 each at an issue price of Rs 70 per share. At the time of the IPO the company had a solid base of advertisers with 249 clients (402 brands), in the last three months this base has grown to 321 clients (565 brands) for the year as a whole.
The NDTV scrip is currently trading at Rs 85.25.
News Broadcasting
Book Cricket gets a digital century on News18 amid T20 fever
Nostalgic classroom game revamped in English, Hindi plus Telugu on web and app.
MUMBAI: When the T20 World Cup fever hits fever pitch, News18 decides to flip the script straight back to the classroom. The digital news platform has revived the timeless schoolyard favourite Book Cricket as an interactive online game, perfectly timed to ride the cricket wave gripping fans across the globe. The reimagined Book Cricket ditches textbooks for smartphones, blending old-school nostalgia with modern gameplay. Once a sneaky recess pastime played by flicking book pages to score runs, the digital version now offers seamless fun for anyone craving a quick cricket fix between overs.
Available in English, Hindi and Telugu (with more languages planned across News18’s network), the game sits within the platform’s fast-growing gaming portfolio of over 20 titles, all built in-house. It joins event-driven hits like ‘Kursi Catcher’ and ‘Result Rewind’ during the 2025 Bihar Assembly Elections, plus festive specials such as ‘Durga’s Astras’ for Durga Puja and ‘Mouse Modak’ for Ganesh Chaturthi.
News18 Digital CEO Mitul Sangani said, “Gaming is a key pillar of our engagement strategy. At News18, we uniquely combine our newsroom agility with immersive gaming experiences. By blending credible content with interactive formats, we are creating meaningful engagement in an era defined by shrinking attention spans and evolving consumption habits.”
Select titles have expanded beyond News18.com to CNBC-TV18.com and Firstpost.com, reflecting the network’s push to deepen user interaction across platforms. The Book Cricket game is live now at https://www.news18.com/games/book-cricket/.
In a tournament where every boundary counts, News18’s digital Book Cricket proves the simplest games can still deliver the biggest smiles no syllabus required, just pure cricket joy one page-flip at a time.
