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SET expects to reach full subscriber base within a month
Sony Entertainment Television, which joined Star India and Zee TV as a completely pay-driven bouquet when its flagship channel became fully encrypted on 1 September, expects to reach a subscriber base of 26 million viewing homes within the next 30 days.
According to Shantonu Aditya, senior V-P franchise channels and distribution, Sony has already achieved a subscriber base of 20 million after the rollout of over 4,500 set top boxes in the A and B centres across the country. Distribution was going on across other centres at a fast clip, Aditya said.
Aditya said that due to the improved yield that had been achieved (yield is defined by the average number of subscribers that the cable operator declares per box) SET had significantly reduced estimates on the number of boxes that would be required to reach a subscriber base (26 million) equal to that existing pre-encryption. Aditya said he hoped to achieve his target with the rollout of 6,000 boxes but added that at the end of it all that figure might reach as high as 7,000.
That is still far lower than the original estimate of a 10,000 box requirement for full rollout.
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India’s AI Future Gets a Neural Kick-Off in Delhi
NDTV IND.AI Summit on 18 Feb 2026 to debate governance, ethics, and India’s big-tech ambitions.
MUMBAI: Artificial intelligence is about to get a very Delhi welcome smart, spirited, and ready to out-think the room. On 18 February 2026, New Delhi plays host to the inaugural NDTV IND.AI Summit, a high-stakes pow-wow that promises to put India’s AI ambitions under the brightest spotlight yet. Billed as a deep dive into how artificial intelligence is already rewiring the nation’s economy, policy playbook, and strategic dreams, the one-day event is curated by NDTV in partnership with the Startup Policy Forum. At its core lies a single, sharp question: how do you unleash AI’s transformative power while keeping trust, equity, and sanity intact?
The guest list reads like a who’s-who of global AI heavyweights. Former UK prime minister Rishi Sunak headlines a special session on AI in governance, sharing hard-won lessons on how the technology is reshaping statecraft and decision-making. Joining the fray are OpenAI’s Chris Lehane, UC Berkeley’s AI safety pioneer Stuart Russell, and Google’s James Manyika, voices that will anchor India firmly in the international conversation on accountability, risk, and cross-border cooperation.
Beyond the policy wonks, the Summit rolls up its sleeves for real-world impact. General Catalyst’s Hemant Taneja and other top-tier investors will unpack how AI is redrawing the rules of capital, innovation, and long-term value creation. Separate tracks will tackle AI’s footprint in workplaces, large-scale adoption, productivity shifts, evolving job roles, and organisational culture. India’s digital public infrastructure, often hailed as a global blueprint for inclusive tech gets its own spotlight, alongside a dedicated segment on AI sovereignty: what does true national control look like in a borderless tech universe?
NDTV CEO and editor-in-chief Rahul Kanwal framed the event’s bigger picture, “The IND.AI Summit is about the kind of future we are choosing to build. India has the scale, the talent, and the moral imagination to shape how AI serves society and this Summit is our way of bringing the most credible voices together to define that direction.”
In a world where AI chatter can feel abstract, the New Delhi gathering aims to ground the debate in India’s own story, one that ties cutting-edge innovation to public purpose, domestic priorities to global influence, and raw ambition to responsible stewardship. Whether you’re an algorithm enthusiast or just mildly curious about tomorrow’s headlines, this Summit is India signalling it’s not just catching the AI wave, it intends to help steer it.
