Zee Entertainment Enterprise Ltd believes that the next phase of its growth will come from the digital vertical. The company, which launched OTT platform Zee5, said that its digital linear TV platform DittoTV and OZee, will be merged into this new entity. In an interview with BusinessLine , Amit Goenka, CEO, Zee International and Z5 Global, said the company plans to puts its might behind the digital business as more consumers come into the digital folds.

Most of your rivals are already way ahead of the curve in the OTT game. In that sense, aren’t you a late entrant in the business?

We were the pioneers in the digital space when we launched Ditto TV in 2012.

We took learnings from both DittoTV and Ozee to launch Zee5. Digital will be pillar of our expansion in coming years. We have introduced various features to easy navigation.

What happens to the existing subscribers of DittoTV and Ozee?

Most subscribers will be migrated to Zee5. Zee5 will replace its existing subscription and ad-based platforms namely DittoTV and OZEE who will be auto-upgraded. DittoTV users were paying ₹20 per month will continue till their subscription ends. Zee5 will be priced at ₹150 per month. We have created an introductory offer of ₹99.

Content is the king in the OTT space. What is Zee5’s content strategy?

Zee library has close to 100,000 hours of content. Besides this, we are focussing heavily on regional and original content. We will be re-purposing some of our existing content. We are also launching content in 12 Indian languages and also introduced features such as voice search and browsing in local languages. Our content pipeline will include Originals, Indian and international movies, TV shows, music, health and lifestyle videos across languages. We plan to launch one original every month.

Building a digital platform requires huge investments. What has been the investment into Zee5?

We don’t want to get into numbers. All we can say is that a huge amount of investment has gone in building the digital platform. Our digital platform will be aimed at both domestic and global audience. All we can tell you is that going forward 80 per cent of our viewership traction will come from the digital space