iWorld
MX Player dominates COTT’s Top ten OTT shows of 2022 in India
Mumbai: MX Player has once again cemented its position as a leader amongst OTT platforms in India taking a commanding lead in the ‘Top ten OTT shows of 2022 list across India’ by Chrome OTT (COTT), with the most number of shows compared to others in the list. Three of its shows – Shiksha Mandal, Dharavi Bank, and Roohaniyat Season two – are on the list. MX Player’s web series have consistently seen success and it has outshone others such as Prime Video, Netflix, Disney+Hotstar, and Zee5, to be the leader in the Indian OTT space. Shiksha Mandal, MX Player’s Original crime thriller series, achieved the number two spot with 39.10 million views, while Suniel Shetty’s OTT debut Dharavi Bank secured number four with 33.04 million views. Roohaniyat Season two was positioned at spot number nine with 25.95 million views. This achievement is a testament to its commitment to delivering engaging entertainment to its audiences.
While MX Player has successfully managed to secure three spots on the list, Disney+Hotstar’s Criminal Justice: Adhura Sach was number one and House of Dragons secured the number ten spot with 70.36 million and 37.71 million views, respectively. Maharani season two from SonyLiv has secured the number 5 spot with 32.65 million views, while Delhi Crime Season two from Netflix has claimed the number six spot with 31.51 million views. The number seven and number eight spots have been taken by Prime Video’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power and Zee5’s Duranga with 31.20 million and 28.98 million views, respectively. Finally, Netflix’s Jamtara Season 2 has secured the number ten spot on the list with a reach of 25.75 million views.
Chrome Data Analytics & media founder & CEO Pankaj Krishna said, “Entertainment acts as a huge stabilizer for hope and despair during turbulent times. Entertainment builds movement, sometimes even collective consciousness surpassing strained realities and obscure tragedies. OTT platforms have certainly cracked the formula. The rising ‘chord-cutting phenomenon has further cemented a promising future with unprecedented numbers conceptualizing a winning formula for the times ahead.”
iWorld
Meta plans 8,000 layoffs in new AI-led restructuring wave
First phase from May 20 may cut 10 per cent workforce amid AI pivot.
MUMBAI: At Meta, the future may be artificial but the cuts are very real. The social media giant is reportedly preparing a fresh round of layoffs, with an initial wave expected to impact around 8,000 employees as it doubles down on its artificial intelligence ambitions. According to a Reuters report, the first phase of job cuts is slated to begin on May 20, targeting roughly 10 per cent of Meta’s global workforce. With nearly 79,000 employees on its rolls as of December 31, the move marks one of the company’s most significant workforce reductions in recent years.
And this may only be the beginning. Sources indicate that additional layoffs are being planned for the second half of the year, although the scale and timing remain fluid, likely to be shaped by how Meta’s AI capabilities evolve in the coming months. Earlier reports had suggested that total cuts in 2026 could reach 20 per cent or more of its workforce.
The restructuring comes as chief executive Mark Zuckerberg continues to steer the company towards an AI-first operating model, committing hundreds of billions of dollars to the transition. Internally, this shift is already visible: teams within Reality Labs have been reorganised, engineers have been moved into a newly formed Applied AI unit, and a Meta Small Business division has been created to align with broader structural changes.
The trend is hardly isolated. Across the tech sector, companies are trimming headcount while investing aggressively in automation. Amazon, for instance, has reportedly cut around 30,000 corporate roles nearly 10 per cent of its white-collar workforce citing efficiency gains driven by AI. Data from Layoffs.fyi shows over 73,000 tech employees have already lost jobs this year, compared with 153,000 in all of 2024.
For Meta, the move echoes its earlier “year of efficiency” in 2022–23, when about 21,000 roles were eliminated amid slowing growth and market pressures. This time, however, the backdrop is different. The company is financially stronger, generating over $200 billion in revenue and $60 billion in profit last year, with shares up 3.68 per cent year-to-date though still below last summer’s peak.
That contrast underlines the shift underway. These layoffs are less about survival and more about reinvention. As Meta restructures itself around AI from autonomous coding agents to advanced machine learning systems, the question is no longer whether the company will change, but how many roles will be left unchanged when it does.
