“We’d like to stay in that market. But we’re also looking to see whether we can, obviously, strengthen our hand and improve the bottom line,” Iger said in response to a question about the company’s India business during the Q4 2023 earnings call.
While stating that Disney is considering various options for the India business, which comprises 77 TV channels and one streaming platform, Disney+ Hotstar, Iger added that the company has an opportunity to strengthen its hand in the market.
“We’re considering our options there. We have an opportunity to strengthen our hand. It is now maybe the most populous country in the world, or maybe just still second to China and about to pass them,” he noted.
Disney has held talks with multiple parties, including Reliance Industries, for the sale of its Indian assets. Media analysts say if the proposed transaction between Disney and Reliance, which owns Viacom18, goes through, it will lead to the creation of a media goliath with an estimated Rs 25,000 crore in topline.
Iger said that the company’s linear business in India does quite well and throws up a lot of cash. “But we know that other parts of that business are challenged for us and for others. And we are looking, I’ll call it expensively,” he said.Star India’s entertainment segment is profitable, while the sports and streaming segments are losing money.During the quarter ending September 30, Disney+ Hotstar’s paid subscriber base fell 7% QoQ or 2.8 million to 37.6 million. The total subscriber loss now stands at 23.8 million between October 2022 to September 2023 due to the loss of the Indian Premier League (IPL) digital rights and the non-renewal of the HBO content deal.
The platform’s average monthly revenue per paid subscriber increased from $0.59 to $0.70 due to a lower mix of wholesale subscribers and higher advertising revenue.
The company’s sports business in India under Star Sports saw its operating profit shrink 29% YoY to $12 million while revenue fell 21% YoY to $92 million. As reported earlier, the India sports business reported an operating loss of $444 million for the nine-month period ending July 1. It earned $637 million in revenue during the period under review.
For the fiscal ended September, Walt Disney’s operating profit rose 6% to $12.8 billion while revenue increased 7% to $88.8 billion. Revenue from the streaming business, including Disney+ Hotstar, increased 12% to $21.9 billion while operating loss decreased 35% to $2.6 billion.
In addition to the $5.5 billion cost reduction plan announced earlier, Disney said it would cut another $2 billion in expenses, increasing its annualised efficiency target to $7.5 billion.
The company expects total content spend in fiscal 2024 to be approximately $25 billion, which is a decrease of $2 billion versus 2023, as a result of its continued efforts to be more efficient in content spend, in addition to impacts from the strikes and the timing of sports payments.
Walt Disney-owned Star India’s consolidated net profit for FY23 has dropped 31% year over year to Rs 1272 crore compared to Rs 1834 crore in the previous fiscal. While the company’s operating revenue from TV and digital businesses increased by 6% to Rs 19,857 crore, its total income increased by 9% to Rs 20699 crore.