MAM
RBL Bank & BookMyShow signs agreement to launch ‘Play’ credit card
Mumbai: After the successful launch of Fun Plus in 2016, RBL Bank and BookMyShow have once again joined hands to cement their long-standing partnership further by bringing a new credit card, ‘Play,’ to take the entertainment quotient for Indian audiences several notches higher.
‘Play’ will be available to selected customers on BookMyShow. It will give them access to lucrative offers on transactions across movies, live entertainment offerings (online and offline), as well as binge-watching movies and TV series on its streaming platform by renting or buying a title, while enjoying benefits with every purchase made.
Consumers will be able to track the entire journey from application to delivery of the ‘Play’ credit card on BookMyShow, with real-time updates enabled within the platform.
The launch of the ‘Play’ credit card in partnership with BookMyShow gives RBL Bank a fillip to their efforts to remain closely associated with a vast, young, digitally-savvy, spending consumer base across industries including media & entertainment, food & beverages, and consumer-facing brands in line with the demographic of the BookMyShow audience.
With ‘Play,’ RBL Bank will be able to reach BookMyShow’s wide base of 200 million monthly customer visits and five billion monthly page views, offering unmatched experiences to India’s entertainment-seeking audience.
Apart from the core entertainment offerings, ‘Play’ owners will also be able to avail varied offers on brands including boAt, Myntra, WOW Momos, Archies, Cookie Man, Ixigo, and Eat Sure listed within the F&B section of BookMyShow.
Commenting on the partnership, BookMyShow head of partnerships & revenue Samradha Tibrewala said, “Credit cards have been amongst the strongest, most pervasively used modes of transaction for millions of customers on BookMyShow and so the idea was to deepen our existing partnership with RBL Bank towards an offering that enables users to get the most out of their preferred mode of transaction on our platform with an added special layer for all their entertainment needs. Coupled with the festive season ahead, the avenues for discovery-led transactions are multi-fold for BookMyShow consumers, making the availability of the ‘Play’ credit card extremely timely and strategic, enabling users to eke out maximum bang for their buck. The ‘Play’ credit card makes a significant contribution to increasing our shared reach and helping one of India’s foremost banks reach out to a larger cohort of young and digitally-savvy audiences through BookMyShow. We look forward to many more such collaborative innovations to bring the best of experiences for an entertainment-loving India.”
Speaking on the launch of the ‘Play’ credit card, RBL Bank credit cards head product Utkarsh Saxena said, “With covid-19 restrictions now a thing of the past, customer spending on movies, events, food and beverages, and other entertainment avenues is on the rise again. We hope to capitalise on this opportunity and enhance our versatile product portfolio. Our partnership with BookMyShow for the launch of the ‘Play’ credit card is a step in that direction as it gives us exclusive access to India’s young and tech-savvy entertainment audiences to stay relevant with the times.”
MAM
Sameer Nair shares heartfelt note as he exits Applause Entertainment
After nine years building the streamer’s content engine, one of India’s best-known TV men is moving on
MUMBAI: Sameer Nair is out. The chief executive of Applause Entertainment, the content studio backed by Kumar Mangalam Birla’s media empire, has announced his departure after nearly nine years at the helm, closing the chapter on one of Indian entertainment’s more quietly consequential careers.
Nair, who built Applause from the ground up in its current avatar, oversaw a slate that spanned Indian originals and international adaptations, threading together a hub-and-spoke business model that partnered with streaming platforms, broadcasters and production houses alike. The results were uneven, as they always are in content, but the ambition was not.
In a post on LinkedIn, Nair was generous to his outgoing patron. He thanked Birla for being an “inspirational boss and a great patron of the arts,” and signed off with a cheerful “Au Revoir” and a promise to remain Applause’s biggest cheerleader. Whether that sentiment survives the next chapter remains to be seen.
No successor has been named. Applause Entertainment did not immediately comment.
Nair built the machine. Now someone else has to run it — and in a streaming market that is simultaneously consolidating and convulsing, that is no small ask.
