DTH
BBC in content deal with Chinese portal
MUMBAI: Users of Chinese web portal QQ.com can now learn English directly from the site thanks to a partnership deal with BBC World Service. It is the first Chinese portal to enter content partnership with the BBC.
From today 14 February 2007, users of the portal will be able to access BBC Learning English content specially tailored for Chinese speakers.
BBC Learning English teaches reading, listening and comprehension. It explains various points of the English language through human interest stories and topics including UK lifestyle and culture.
The BBC will start English teaching on QQ.com with two popular features, Take Away English and Quizzes. Take Away English the BBC says has been a hit with Chinese users as it offers MP3 audio and pdf text downloads, so the learner can quite literally take away the BBC’s English lessons.
Topics range from the latest Harry Potter book and online gaming to Chinese football players, and include listening, reading, exercises and an audio glossary. Quizzes offers learners an interactive test of their English vocabulary and grammar and helps them with teacher feedback.
Looking ahead at what BBC Learning English has in store for Chinese online users, Alison Konieczny, who is the editor of BBC English Language Teaching China team said, “We are planning to treat Chinese learners to two more features which will enrich their English vocabulary in fun and entertaining ways. Real English teaches words and phrases learners won’t necessarily find in their dictionaries, and Word Master is an interactive game which tests and teaches vocabulary common in English proficiency exams.”
“I can’t think of a better day to launch our partnership with QQ.com than 14 February, which of course is Valentine’s Day. It’s a memorable day for a lot of people, and I hope Chinese learners will fall in love with our BBC pages and make us a regular date!”
BBC World Service’s Business Development Manager for China and North Asia, Raymond Li said, “We are delighted to partner with one of the leading national portal sites in China to provide quality English learning content to many learners in China. Internet has become an increasingly popular and effective learning platform among young people, and the BBC has been building up successful partnership with China’s local portal sites over last few years. Our new partnership deal with QQ.com will help us reach more online learners in China, therefore bringing more benefit to them, too.”
BBC Learning English offers English language teaching programmes and online content for a global radio and online audience.
English learning materials are available online at bblearningenglish.com and, for Chinese speakers, on bbcchina.com.cn.
DTH
Prasar Bharati’s WAVES earns Rs 2.9 crore in first year
Platform scales content, users but monetisation gaps limit revenue growth.
MUMBAI: Big waves, small ripples at least for now. When Prasar Bharati launched its OTT platform WAVES at the 55th International Film Festival of India in November 2024, it pitched a bold vision: a homegrown rival to global and domestic streaming giants, blending video, audio, gaming and commerce into a single digital ecosystem. Five months into FY2024–25, however, the platform’s revenue stands at just Rs 2.90 crore, a figure that underscores the gap between ambition and monetisation.
On paper, WAVES looks anything but modest. The platform has ingested 13,608 titles, totalling 9,495 hours of content, with over 13,000 titles already live. It has streamed more than 575 live events from the Mahakumbh Amrit Snan and the 76th Republic Day parade to the Hockey India League, Kabaddi World Cup and Mann Ki Baat while offering 74 live TV channels and 12 radio channels. With over 10 lakh registered users and more than 200 content partners onboarded, the scale resembles that of a fully operational streaming service rather than a pilot project.
The architecture supporting this scale is equally robust. Built under Prasar Bharati’s Central Archives vertical, WAVES runs on a cloud-based infrastructure with DRM, encryption and an integrated analytics dashboard. It includes dedicated units for content ingestion, quality control, publishing, graphics, marketing and billing, and is distributed across platforms such as OTTplay, Tata Play and BSNL. The offering extends beyond video to include audio-on-demand, e-games and even e-commerce via ONDC integration.
Yet, the numbers reveal a core disconnect. Despite its scale, WAVES generated just Rs 2.90 crore in a market where India’s OTT industry crossed Rs 23,000 crore in 2024. A key bottleneck lies in monetisation infrastructure: subscriptions cannot currently be purchased within the app and must be completed via an external website. In a mobile-first country where over 95 per cent of OTT consumption happens on smartphones, this extra step creates friction that most users are unlikely to overcome.
Ironically, content is not the problem, it is the platform’s biggest strength. Prasar Bharati holds one of the world’s richest broadcast archives, including 45,154 hours of digitised Akashvani programming and 35,723 hours from Doordarshan. For WAVES alone, over 3,800 hours of archival content have been made OTT-ready, including classics such as Ramayan and Shaktimaan, alongside rare cultural recordings and historical broadcasts.
There are early signs that this library holds commercial potential. Revenue from archival content licensing rose sharply to Rs 3.38 crore in FY24, up from Rs 67 lakh the previous year. Meanwhile, free digital platforms continue to drive massive reach, the PB Archives Youtube channel clocked 119.78 million views and added 4,02,000 subscribers in FY2024–25, crossing 1.7 million in total, while DD News has over 5.84 million subscribers.
That, however, presents a strategic dilemma. While free distribution builds scale, it also conditions audiences to expect content at zero cost making it harder to transition to paid models. WAVES, designed as a hybrid AVOD-SVOD platform with advertising and subscription layers, is yet to fully crack this balance.
The broader challenge is not technological but strategic. In an ecosystem dominated by platforms offering seamless payments, aggressive pricing and high-budget originals, WAVES is still bridging the gap between being a content repository and a commercially viable product.
For now, the platform reflects both promise and paradox. It has the scale, the content and the infrastructure but until monetisation catches up, WAVES remains less a revenue engine and more a digital showcase of what India’s public broadcaster could become.
