To say that TV has lost IPL audience to digital is factually incorrect: Disney Star’s Sanjog Gupta

The Indian Premier League (IPL) has been a rage in the country and abroad since its first season in 2008. Disney Star, the official television broadcaster of TATA IPL 2023, told Business Today that peak concurrency in the first 10 matches of the marquee cricket tournament touched 5.6 crore—the highest it has ever been (excluding the two years of Covid), thus, returning to their 2019 high. 

“The peak concurrency which measures the intensity of viewership which is how many people are watching at the same time is the highest it has ever been. To say that we’ve lost audiences to digital would be incorrect. Is there an overlap of audiences watching TV and digital? Of course. We believe it’s not a zero-sum game. A viewer at times would choose convenience when they don’t have TV access and at times would choose a deeper more immersive experience,” Sanjog Gupta, Head - Sports, Disney Star, said.

He said that he’s hoping that the overall watch time and the entire tech base also records new highs. According to the company, Reliance Jio, which is the digital streaming partner for the event, reached a concurrency of 1.8 crore. Mukesh Ambani-backed Viacom18 had won the digital streaming rights from 2023 to 2027, for Rs 23,758 crore ($2.89 billion), which Disney previously held. Gupta claimed that they have 30-40 per cent higher engagement per viewer as compared to digital. 

“To say that TV has lost audiences to digital is factually incorrect. There’s no data that suggests that. When I’m commuting and I want to watch IPL I have no option but to pick up my 6 inch screen. Perhaps there will be an increasing overlap as we go forward. Both platforms have their virtues,” he said.

Digital screen, according to him, tends to be high frequency and low session times: you login more often but you won’t be able to spend much time on a screen continuously on a small screen. 

“Retention of viewers is a problem. That screen doesn’t lend itself to long session engagement, TV has lesser frequency but much higher retention and that’s why the peak concurrency of TV is always a multiple of digital. For first 10 matches peak digital concurrency was 1.8 crores. The reason for almost 3.5x peak concurrency is longer session time,” he added.