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YOU’RE STILL NOT CONTENT,

ARE YOU?
THE OTT CONTENT WAR

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RECAP
The OTT market represents a highly lucrative opportunity with significant growth in recent
years and the entry of many new players – both content providers and distributors. However,
their model of engagement and investment has seen a tectonic shift over the years with
content becoming king. Every player, big or small, wants to differentiate itself in terms of the
uniqueness and diversity of content they offer. Every company in this space has been paying
greater attention and making larger investments to ensure unique content. However,
strategically this meant different choices for different platforms. While Netflix chose to
invest in original shows, Hotstar chose sports, Amazon Prime and Zee5 chose movie
premiers, and Jio chose a distributor model preferring to license regional content from
smaller content producers.

As the CEO of company X, you presented recommendations to your board in terms of the
industry evolution expected over the next five years, the direction X should take in that
scenario and the financial justification of the same.

THE STORY CONTINUES…

While the board members were pleased with your strategic vision, they were not satisfied
with your analytical rigour in examining the industry, exhaustive coverage of the issues that
X is facing, and overall imagination of the future. They seek more clarity on the following in
the next board meeting:
• Do you expect the OTT industry to follow the past trends (in terms of market size, shares,
preferred business models, etc.) or can you reimagine its likely evolution given the
changing global scenario? How do you visualize the structure of this industry by 2025?
• What is the impact that these trends will have on the key stakeholders of the industry,
such as OTT players & their business models, content owners, content distributors? How
do you expect the relationships between these stakeholders to evolve?
• What are the KPIs that X should target? Does X have any competitors, collaborators,
enemies or possible imitators? How should we deal with them?
• Do you expect consumers tastes and preferences to remain the same or to evolve? How
would the technological capabilities of consumers and platforms evolve? How would X
keep up with these content and technical requirements?
• What are the lessons that X can learn from more mature markets and parallel industries?
• Can you break your strategy into short/medium term (5 years) and long term
(10-15 years)?

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 SO, WHAT DO WE NEED FROM YOU?

As CEO of company X, operating in the domestic OTT space, you are given a final chance to
impress your board. Your aim is to increase your profit margins within the short/medium
term (5 years) and align it with a long-term strategy (10-15 years) for sustainable growth.

• Pick a company X within the Indian OTT market – this can be the same as the one you
chose in the previous round, or you can pick a different company.
• Address all questions posed by the board.
• Selection of X should be justified along the line of thinking posed in the board’s questions
and should be duly supported by granular strategies, including financials.

Submission specifications:
• The deadline to submit the presentations on D2C is 12:00 PM, 24th October 2020.
• You would be allotted exactly 10 minutes for your presentation, followed by 5 minutes
for Q&A. There are no restrictions on the number of slides. Kindly ensure that you adhere
to the specified time limit. Ten minutes is a hard stop and you will not be allowed to
present beyond it.
• The date (24th or 25th October) and time slot for the final presentation will be
communicated later via email.

EVALUATION CRITERIA
• Uniqueness and justification of X
• Coherence of strategy vis-à-vis the direction of the company and the evolution of the
industry that you envision
• Feasibility, creativity, and persuasiveness in answering the board’s queries
• Effectiveness in presenting your ideas and answering follow-up questions raised by the
judges during the Q&A round

Please note:
• Non-adherence to the time limit and hygiene factors have a bearing on your scores.
• The evaluation panel is comprised of industry experts who will not have context on your
previous submission.
• Do not shy away from being creative in your approach and solution, but the onus is on
you to be exhaustive and lucid in your analysis and to provide the context on your choice
of X.
All the best!

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B. Long Term:
1. Global trends : Tech, Consumer behaviour.
2. Likely reshaping of the OTT industry by this.

Exhibit 9. User break-up by income

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