Saregama India makes radio foray with Timber Media

Will launch 150 radio channels across mobile, direct-to-home and internet platforms

In a strategic move to enhance its music offerings globally, Saregama India Ltd (formerly The Gramophone Company India Ltd - HMV) has acquired a minority stake in Timbre Media Pvt Ltd. With this acquisition, Saregama now holds 10% equity interest in Timbre. The financial value of this transaction however, has not been made public.

As per the strategic alliance, the two parties will provide a high-quality and variety of genre-based radio channels. The association will also revive brand Worldspace which is under a licensing arrangement with Timber Media in addition to introducing another channel called Timber Radio by Saregame India as part of the initial offering. The radio channels will be made available through mobile, direct-to-home (DTH) and internet platforms.

Adarsh Gupta, Business Head – Music at Saregama India, said, “We will target the Indian market to start and will eventually extend the service to every international market with a considerable Indian population. The idea is to offer genre-based programming to the audience with as many as 150 channels offering different kinds of music to meet their specific tastes at different times of the day.”

The content for these radio channels will be sourced from Saregama’s extensive library in addition to music from other popular labels. A round the clock service, the radio stations will offer a variety of Indian music ranging from old hindi films, hindustani classical, carnatic classical, new hindi music, ghazals and stations in all major Indian languages.

M Sebastian, co-founder and CEO, Timbre Media, said, the company was instituted in 2010 and has over time established critical infrastructure needed for high quality services, including new studio facilities in Mumbai and Bangalore. “We have been steadily building partnerships and clientele in the radio and music industry including Saregama. This partnership will significantly enhance our ability to package and distribute quality music content and chalk out an aggressive expansion plan going forward,” said Sebastian.

An interesting part of this initiative will be the approach to programme, package and price the radio channels making it a very attractive proposition to the end user. “It will be like an fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) approach to packaging and pricing the offerings. So people can subscribe the channels for as little as 2 minutes with no outer limit depending upon their choice and requirement. Pricing and packaging details are currently being worked out and we shall be in a position to give out details in a few weeks from now,” said Gupta.

With discussions and negotiations currently on with mobile and DTH operators in the country, the service is very likely to hit the market through the mobile operators followed by DTH operators. The company expects to launch the the service in the market in another 6 – 8 weeks from now.