Cable TV
Hinduja group pays HITS licence fee
MUMBAI: Grant Investrade, which is a 100 per cent subsidiary of Hinduja Ventures, today paid the Rs 10 crore licence fee to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB). The group is now awaiting the MIB’s letter of intent to apply for the WPC clearance.
With this, the $100 million HITS Hinduja project will start rolling out. “We made the payment today. We are eagerly waiting for the letter of intent by the MIB to proceed with the next step,” informs IMCL MD & group CEO Tony D’silva exclusively to indiantelevision.com.
Following this, the company will also make the Rs 40 crore bank guarantee deposit. “We will now move towards signing agreements with the satellite provider and finalising site location,” adds D’silva.
The next 10 days are going to be very busy for D’silva, who is at the helm of the HITS project. The company will start with the promotional activities, discussions with the last mile owners, creation of organisational structure, appointment of distributors and discussions with vendors in the next one week or so.
“The HITS project will be up and running in the next six months,” he informs.
While the HITS licence was obtained on 6 March, what took the company so long to pay the licence fee? Answers D’silva, “When we got the permission, immediately the elections dates were announced, so we lost time on that. Also we weren’t clear whether the government was committed to phase III and IV. Now since we have enough clarity, we decided to go ahead with the first step of paying the licence fee.”
Through HITS, the company is looking at capturing 15-20 per cent of the 120 million households in phase III and phase IV markets. While the technology team is already in place, the others will be appointed soon.
D’silva hopes to be able to create better packages for the HITS platform. “Broadcasters should consider re-pricing their channels. The packaging and bundling of channels needs to be different for phase III and IV. With phase I and II contributing to 75 per cent or more of their existing revenues that is from 30 million homes, phase III and IV which has close to 100 million homes, the broadcasters should reduce their rates to one-third of the existing rates,” he opines.
Apart from HITS, the group’s IndusInd Media and Communications Limited (IMCL) will also see a major boost in terms of the number of channels the MSO currently provides. “We will be increasing the number of channel offering from the current 350 to 500. This will help us become more competitive on ground,” he says.
IMCL in the next one or one and a half months will also launch a prepaid model for its subscribers. “We are talking to other MSOs in Mumbai and the Maharashtra Cable Operators Federation (MCOF) for this. I am hoping that all the other MSOs across the country will also join us for the prepaid model,” says D’silva.
The HITS model will have a complete different vertical which will cater to all the content and video on demand (VOD) services requirements. “The services will be made available to all the LMOs along with IMCL,” concludes D’silva.
Cable TV
Hathway Cable appoints Gurjeev Singh Kapoor as CEO
Leadership change comes as cable TV faces shrinking subscriber base and modest earnings pressure
MUMBAI: Hathway Cable and Datacom has tapped industry veteran Gurjeev Singh Kapoor as chief executive officer, marking a leadership pivot at a time when India’s cable television business is under mounting strain.
Kapoor will take over from Tavinderjit Singh Panesar, who is set to retire in August after a long innings with the company. Panesar, chief executive since 2023, has held multiple leadership roles at Hathway, including his latest stint beginning in 2022.
Kapoor brings more than three decades of experience in media and entertainment. He most recently led distribution at The Walt Disney Company’s Star India business, now part of JioStar. His career spans television distribution and affiliate partnerships, with stints at Sony Pictures Networks India, Discovery Communications and Zee Entertainment.
Panesar, with over three decades in the industry, has worked across strategic planning, distribution and business development in media, broadcasting and manufacturing. His past associations include ESPN Star Sports, Star India, Apollo Tyres and JK Industries.
The transition lands as the cable sector grapples with structural disruption. Traditional operators are losing ground to streaming platforms, while telecom and broadband players tighten the squeeze with bundled offerings.
An EY report estimates India’s pay-TV base could shrink by a further 30 to 40 million households by 2030, taking the total down to 71 to 81 million. The slide follows a loss of nearly 40 million homes between 2018 and 2024, a contraction that has already wiped out more than 37,000 jobs in the local cable operator ecosystem.
Hathway’s numbers reflect the strain. The company reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 93 crore for FY25, down from Rs 99 crore a year earlier. Revenue inched up to Rs 2,040 crore from Rs 1,981 crore. As of December 2025, it had about 4.7 million cable TV subscribers and roughly 1.02 million broadband users.
Kapoor steps in with a familiar brief but a shrinking playbook. In a market where viewers are cutting cords faster than companies can reinvent them, the new chief executive inherits a business fighting to stay plugged in.
