iWorld
ZEE5 partners with FreeCharge
MUMBAI: ZEE5 – India’s largest ConTech brand, and FreeCharge – one of the leading digital platforms for financial services and products, have come together to give another reason for the audience to cheer this festive season. FreeCharge customers can now purchase a Zee5 subscription through the wallet at their convenience, thus allowing them access to the 100,000+ hours of content across 12 languages.
FreeCharge, a wholly owned subsidiary of Axis Bank Limited, is India’s No.1 payments app. Customers across the country use FreeCharge to make prepaid, postpaid, DTH, metro recharge and utility bill payments. The organization as part of their expansion into a full-fledged digital financial services platform also offers services like lending, gold, digital credit card and mutual funds to name a few. Through this partnership both the brands promise to delight customers on every level, from payments to consuming content anytime, anywhere.
Commenting on the partnership, ZEE5 India business development and commercial head Manpreet Bumrah said, “Non-traditional partnerships have been proven to be a great growth-hack for ZEE5 in the past 22 months. With our customer first approach, ZEE5 has always worked towards making our viewers’ life easier and entertaining. Digital wallets for payments are now a part of the common man’s life, and through this association we aim to create an entertaining and a pocket friendly deal for our audience.”
FreeCharge CEO Siddharth Mehta said, “We are happy to partner with ZEE5, the largest ConTech brand in India. OTT platforms have become the latest disruptors in the content sharing space and are slowly overtaking the traditional way of how people consume media. This partnership will further augment our engagement with the digital natives and strengthen our positioning in this space. At FreeCharge, we have tailor made products targeted to the relevant customer segment, ensuring we move along and stay pertinent to the swiftly evolving needs of the quintessential digital native. We continue to focus on enhancing user experience and adding more functionalities as the space matures.”
ZEE5 has rolled out 100+ originals so far (Feb 2018 to Nov 2019) across genres, and the platform is committed to launching several more in the coming months. It has crossed 90 million+ downloads since launch on the Play store and has recorded a peak 8.9 million DAUs as of September 2019.
iWorld
JioStar revenue hits Rs 9,784 crore as cricket fuels 22 per cent growth
A surge in digital viewership and sports dominance fuels a blockbuster quarter for the media giant
MUMBAI: JioStar is batting on a flat pitch. The media titan’s fourth-quarter results for the financial year 2026 reveal a business scaling new heights, propelled by an unprecedented appetite for premium sports and digital-first storytelling.
Gross revenue for the quarter soared by 22.15 per cent to Rs 9,784 crore, up from Rs 8,010 crore in the third quarter. Operationally, the momentum was equally strong; revenue from operations climbed 21 per cent to Rs 8,372 crore. These figures underscore the firm’s successful integration following the Reliance and Disney merger, creating a dominant force in the Indian market.
The annual performance has been nothing short of a spectacle. Full-year gross revenue reached a massive Rs 36,248 crore, while annual profit after tax hit Rs 3,210 crore. This rapid expansion reflects JioStar’s ability to capture and monetise the massive growth in India’s media consumption.
Cricket proved to be the ultimate growth engine. The ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026 and TATA IPL 2026 delivered “record-breaking viewership” across both television and digital screens. The World Cup final alone drew a global peak concurrency of 72.5 million on JioHotstar, cementing its status as the nation’s premier streaming destination. On television, JioStar maintained a commanding 34.2 per cent viewership share, reaching a staggering 810 million viewers nationwide.
The digital numbers were just as impressive. JioHotstar averaged 500 million monthly active users, driven by consistent subscriber growth and innovative AI-led content discovery tools. These advancements are ensuring that JioStar remains at the cutting edge of the global “Race for Attention.”
With a firm grip on the country’s most valuable sporting rights and a rapidly growing digital footprint, JioStar is perfectly positioned for the future. It has built the ultimate content powerhouse—one that is ready to dominate the Indian living room for years to come.
