This year IPL has has been delayed due to ongoing pandemic. Earlier it was decided to cancel the IPL however BCCI decided to conduct the IPL 2020 in Dubai. There were no audience during the matches and the series got extraordinary response from the fans all over the world.
As there were no audience and the matches were not being played in India, fans enjoyed the matches by watching it on the TV and on their mobile phones. This year also IPL was streamed on Disney+ Hotstar (earlier Hotstar). But this year was different as in this season the online streaming platform decided to skip the free streaming of the matches.
Until last year, Hotstar used to offer free streaming with a delay of few minutes. This does the job for cricket fans as they can watch it without subscribing for paid plans. But starting with this year, Disney+ Hotstar completely skipped the free streaming of IPL. This helped in increasing the paid users of Disney+ in Q4.
Walt Disney and Co. has revealed that it has added over 16 Million new subscribers in Quarter ended September 2020. With this increase in the subscriber count, the total paid subscriber base reaches to 73.7 Million paid users of Disney+ globally. The company didn’t revealed the exact count of Disney+ Hotstar subscribers but it expected to be around 18.5 Million which was around 8.63 Million in Quarter ended in June 2020.
Hotstar gained almost 10 Million new subscribers in Q4. Majority of new subscribers came due to IPL 2020. This season of IPL contributed more than half of the paid subscribers from India. In the recently concluded season, Mumbai Indians won the final and earned the fifth IPL trophy in their name. You can check more sports related news on https://parimatchnews.com/. Rohit Sharma has become the best captain of the IPL as has got five trophies.
Disney+’s overall average revenue per user was at $4.52 for the quarter. If we exclude Disney+ Hotstar then its ARPU was $5.30 said the company. Disney+ Hotstar makes about Rs 163.5 ($2.19) from each subscriber in India every quarter, a significant jump from an ARPU of $0.71 in the previous quarter.
Recently the company also increased the rates of its paid plans in India. The base plan called Disney+ Hotstar VIP costs Rs. 399 for a year while the premium plan costs Rs. 1499. Earlier this plan price was Rs. 999. This plan price hike also contributed in increased revenue per user.
The company is also aggressively trying to increase the subscriber count by partnering with several telecom operators. Disney has tied up with Reliance Jio and Airtel offering free subscription on annual plans. Telecom operators in India are offering free Disney+ Hotstar VIP subscription on annual plans and several monthly prepaid and post paid plans.
The online video streaming platform has also became exclusive premiere partner of several top bollywood films. Many top films have been premiered exclusively on Disney+ Hotstar which also contributed in subscriber growth. All these strategies are driving the growth of online video streaming platform in India and globally.
