Keeping its promise, Amazon launched the Prime Video in India on December 14. The company had hinted at expanding its on-demand media service to 200 countries last month.
Amazon's Prime Video in India promises to give access to loads of media content, including Hollywood movies, Bollywood (Hindi films) and those in Tamil, Telugu, Bengali and Marathi. More in regional languages will be added in coming days. On offer will be films and songs, and also the company's original TV series, including Jeremy Clarkson's popular The Grand Tour, for an annual subscription.
The advent of Amazon Prime Video will trigger a price-war among its arch-rival Netflix and other content providers.
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Here are three reasons that will make Amazon Prime Video a hit among consumers in India:
Most affordable on-demand video subscription in the market:
Amazon Prime Video service costs Rs. 999 per year. As a promotional offer, the company will charge only half the amount (Rs. 499) for the first year. That translates to around Rs. 40 per month, making it the cheapest on-demand video service in the country. Netflix subscriptions come in three slabs. Depending on the demands of customers for more premium content, it charges Rs. 500, Rs. 600 and Rs. 800 a month.
On the other hand, local player Eros Now charges anywhere between Rs 49 and Rs 99 a month and Hotstar, which offers some videos for free, charges Rs 199 a month for premium content.
It has to be noted that Amazon offers free one-month trial to consumers who haven't subscribed to Prime service yet.
Huge stock of movies, including popular TV series and more:
Amazon Prime India webpage has already listed a large number of popular movies, including Sultan, Kabali and other regional movies, songs, children's shows (Chota Bheem, Shinchan, etc.), exclusive Amazon original TV series — Beauty and the Beast, Mozart in the Jungle, The Man in the High Castle, Into the Badlands and more.
Amazon is said to have earmarked a whopping Rs. 2,000 for the Prime video service alone. It recently inked a deal with leading Bollywood studios, including ace director Karan Johar's Dharma Productions, for rights to stream their movies.
Amazon India has already commenced local TV series production on the lines of US-based original serials. Prominent serials that are under development --Bodhidharma: Master of Shaolin ( Ram Madhavi, Prasoon Joshi and Sunil Doshi), Breathe (Vikram Malhotra, starring R Madhvan and Amit Sadh), The Ministry ( AIB and OML), Powerful (Ritesh Sidhwani and Farhan Akhtar starring Vivek Oberoi and Richa Chadda), Mirzapur (Ritesh Sidhwani and Farhan Akhtar), Stardust (Vikramaditya Motwane, Madhu Mantena, Anurag Kashyap and Vikas Bahl), The Family Man (DK Krishna and Raj Nidimoru), Vishpuri (Vikramaditya Motwane, Madhu Mantena, Anurag Kashyap and Vikas Bahl), Made in Heaven (Ritesh Sidhwani, Farhan Akhtar, Zoya Akhtar and Reema Kagti), and many more are under works.
The company is said to be vying to purchase IPL's (Indian Premier League) cricket broadcasting (online) rights as well.
Even Jeremy Clarkson-hosted automobile show, The Grand Tour, which recently beat the popular Game of Thrones as the most pirated TV show of all time, is expected to be made available in India soon.
Value-added service:
Amazon Prime subscribers not only get almost unlimited entertainment content (music, videos, movies and TV series), they also get huge discounts on eBooks with the Kindle tablet. Other privileges include unlimited free two-day shipping and unlimited free same-day delivery on select items.
No other player in the market offers these privileges yet. This may, in fact, push Flipkart and other e-commerce firms to emulate this business model in near future.
