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WWIL to feel Rs 1 bn pinch from HITS
MUMBAI: Wire and Wireless (India) Ltd. has suffered a loss of around Rs 1 billion from its Headend-In-The-Sky (HITS) operations and has suspended the service from 1 April as the government is yet to come out with tariff and content guidelines for the new delivery technology.
WWIL, the first and the only cable TV operator to have launched the service, has invested over Rs 1.5 billion towards HITS.
“We will revive HITS after the guidelines are in place and it is favourable for the industry. We would be losing about Rs 650 million in FY‘10 from the HITS operations. Our total loss on HITS would be Rs 1 billion,” a source said.
WWIL, hoping to get a nationwide footprint through HITS, had purchased 600000 set-top boxes but could manage to deploy around 110000 of them.
The multi-system operator, controlled by the Essel Group, expects losses for the fiscal ended 31 March 2010 to be around Rs 250 million, a lower amount than the losses from HITS, as analogue cable has turned profitable for it.
Revenue could close under Rs 3 billion, primarly led by carriage fee paid by broadcasters. “The carriage fee will account for 50-55 per cent of our total revenues in FY‘10,” the source said.
WWIL has already received Rs 2.2 billion from its proposed Rs 4.5 billion rights issue.
The focus this year will be to expand the analogue business.”We plan to revive in Hyderabad and expand in Bhubaneswar and West Bengal. We will revive our acquisitions drive,” the source said.
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With 57 per cent single new users, Ashley Madison rebrands as discreet dating platform
Platform says majority of new members now identify as single
INDIA: Ashley Madison is shedding the “married-dating” label that defined it for two decades, repositioning itself as a platform for discreet dating in what it calls the post-social media age.
The rebrand, unveiled in India on 27 February, 2026, marks a structural shift in business model and identity. Once synonymous with married dating, the company now describes itself as the “premier destination for discreet dating” under a new tagline: Where Desire Meets Discretion.
The pivot is data-driven. Internal figures show that 57 per cent of global sign-ups between 1 January and 31 December, 2025 identified as single: a notable departure from the platform’s married core. The company argues that its community has already evolved beyond its original positioning.
“In an age where our lives have been constantly put on public display, privacy has become the new luxury,” said Ashley Madison chief strategy officer Paul Keable. He framed the platform’s offering as “ethical discretion” for singles, separated, divorced and non-monogamous users seeking private connections.
The shift also taps into wider digital fatigue. A global survey conducted by YouGov for Ashley Madison, covering 13,071 adults across Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, India, Italy, Mexico, Spain, Switzerland, the UK and the US, found mounting discomfort with hyper-public online lives.
Among dating app users, 30 per cent cited constant swiping and messaging as a source of fatigue, while 24 per cent pointed to pressure to curate public-facing profiles and early personal disclosure. Some 27 per cent said fears of screenshots or information being shared contributed to exhaustion; an equal share cited unwanted attention.
The retreat from oversharing appears broader. According to the survey, 46 per cent of adults actively try to keep most aspects of their life private online. Only 8 per cent feel comfortable sharing most aspects publicly, while 35 per cent say they are becoming more selective about what they disclose.
Ashley Madison is betting that this cultural recalibration towards controlled visibility can be monetised. By doubling down on privacy infrastructure and reframing itself around discretion rather than infidelity, the company is attempting to convert reputational baggage into a premium proposition.
