 We now move into our first panel of the evening. They will be speaking on the topic digital beyond marketing Businesses have typically restricted their use of digital to marketing activities beyond this what more can digital do for the business and customers and What is the next big focus area for them to adopt the digital opportunity a Panel moderator is none other than the chairman and CEO South Asia Densu ages network. Mr. Ashish Bhasin, please welcome him on stage with a huge round of applause and Our panel members are a joy Roy Chaudhary global agency lead EME a Facebook Arnab Goswami MD and editor-in-chief Republic TV Pooja Panam managing director Mena please can we please have a huge round of applause for them Over to you. Mr. Bhasin now. Good evening, everybody and really nice to see a very full haul And I'm not at all surprised because of the quality of speakers that we Have today on this panel as well as the ones before and and the ones coming after So, thank you very much for coming It's really an honor and pleasure to be able to moderate a panel with such Eminent prominent distinguished people in their differing in their respective fields the Slant that we will be taking for this discussion today This panel today is actually slightly different from the general digital marketing Discussion because at Densu ages Network. We now believe that you know Many years ago when I was and and believe it or not I was a young man once but when I was a young man just starting in advertising they used to be Something run by I think the ad club which was called advertising works So it was like a some of you who are from that vintage might remember that used to run sessions Which were called advertising works now they were very popular But I used to be really the peeved at listening to that simply because I've never heard Doctors say medicines work or engineers say engineering work. So I just felt it was too defensive now fast forward 10 or 15 years later Similar sort of things started happening with digital just as much as three to five years ago. We were running a lot of Sort of everybody was trying to make efforts to say digital works and therefore client should get on to digital I think the key thing that happened in 2018 is that that's now over because Frankly if you have to tell a client that digital works, then that's just not the client you should have in your portfolio So the focus and slant I would like to take for I would like the panel to take for this discussion Really is that it's a given digital is and has impacted our lives, but it's not just our lives I don't think there is any business in India, which is not being impacted by digital as we speak It's a way of doing business. You could be a popcorn seller. You could be a television channel. You could be a Retail store, but you could be an advertising agency. There is no single business that is not being Significantly impacted by digital and therefore there is this need for digital transformation I think no better person to talk to us about that than Arnab and I really like this opportunity because very rarely Does anybody get to ask Arnab a question? So I really value this and thank you very much Arnab for For coming here Arnab is a very dangerous man for advertising and I've told him this once before You know he launched Republic TV without spending a single rupee on advertising and before he had launched it Everybody knew what Republic TV was. He just had to go to one college I think it was in Bangalore. He made one speech over there and it just went viral and before you knew it Everybody was speculating Arnab is up to something. It's a channel. It may be called Of course, I'm pretty sure well orchestrated it may be called Republic and he launched Republic TV without spending a single rupee on advertising Which wasn't very good, but having said that he's also done one more thing Which is really the area I want you to talk about when I went to his studio I could see that he had digitally transformed the business of news He told me and I know you take it on from here that his reporters office is actually the mobile phone So a man who's really led digital transformation I would like him to actually start us and tell us about it How did you see this whole thing go about and and what are the various things you're doing in that? So Ashish, thank you very much and it's a pleasure to be here with you once again At this event and to share the stage with with Pooja and with Ajay Thank you. I can assure you first. I want to tell you this that I didn't spend a penny in advertising That's not factually correct completely. I spent a little bit whatever little I had but it doesn't apply the other way round So, you know in case you're trying to pass on a message to me, you know, we are not going to return the favor ever to Denso So So, you know till I'll tell you my view on this my my fund on this is simple that till 2013 end I Did not count digital as a medium that I need to look at Part of that came from the arrogance of television Part of that came from the revenues that we were living on on television And part of it that simply came from the impact that we had in television and the fact that you see Ashish in India Television is still very new You know and and there is a genuine feeling that television is never going to be edged out Which is also true. It may exist in other forms But the newness of a medium sometimes makes you look away from something else that is right there before you so for me in 2014 when we did the when we did the elections I Everyone came to me and said do this do this. So I said why not I then asked myself. How do I use digital? To transform the brand and marketing perception of the channel I was then working for and Then I looked at the marketing budget Which was pathetic So I said what do you do with a marketing budget that is so small. It's not going to get you one-fourth of The front page of the Times of India what we did was we took all that money and We invested it in one hoarding at Times Square in New York So we said that With this idea came to us on a flight where we said this money, you know We you know marketing teams give us look at the money and the marketing teams do this linear management, you know XYZ radio XYZ. I said if I if I'm gonna spread it out Then let can I bring my content mind to it? So I said be beautiful also for the ultimate narcissist that I am I just imagined myself being watched by people who have nothing to do but watch the elections live on a screen and Times Square New York But then along with that we thought we'll add a different element of virality So we spread a WhatsApp message in the relevant groups in New York Among students in the Indian community and we said Samosa party on result day And so we hired people and we bought the samosas and the 2000 samosas been indiscriminately scattered all over New York and we had a crowd and That became a fantastic WhatsAppable video what it did for me Was that first it was a beautiful statement because each time you were hosting the program live in your saying You know BJP at 200 Congress at 30. What's gonna happen? By the way, what's happening in New York? Let's go across New York and then you go to the screen And then if Samosa party going on then the people there on the screen are watching themselves on the big screen And then they start clapping so there's four screens all around right very exciting But later I saw the domino effect of that The domino effect of that was that the only talked about fact besides Narendra Modi being elected there was one moment when we called the election So that video got what sapped multiple times where I said at about I think 1126 I said I think we called the election for the BJP So that that got what's up the only other video that got what sapped was that of the Samosa party in New York And they said, you know the channel has reached New York So it just gave up, you know at that boisterous moment of a government change in a Spirit in the country got merged with that moment and it told me that the nature of marketing Completely changes if you use digital now before I pass on the mic. I'll just give one more example from the recent times Take the most popular conversation in political circles today, which is the Raphael controversy Every day you hear offset this that you know Rahul Gandhi never gives up and it continues supreme court verdict or not continues continues So Ashish it so happened as you know, we are launching Bharat So till about 855. I'm working on the forthcoming Hindi channel at 855 My producers called me that you know, please could you come to the studio? You still have to do a show on English channel. So 855 I go and over the last few days I have not been writing my lead story usually at 830. I write the first two minutes of my show. I Started dictating it and I realized that when you speak your language is different from when you write So that day I was in a great hurry So I dictate a lead story in which I said because I was feeling so fed up with things I said listen Raphael is the biggest fake news story of the world And then I went on and on a little bit little hyperbolic and That went on for one and a half minutes Ashish I Have never got so much traction on anything I have done then the one and a half minute lead story where I went Fundamental to the core and I said Raphael is a fake news story. The story has fallen flat Nobody else but Rahul Gandhi and his chomcha's believe it anymore. The Supreme Court has said no to it Etc. Etc. The beauty of it was that three days back One of these websites published an article where there's an 11 year old boy in London Who has done the same lead story with the exact words that I used and He's done it in his way and then he's added four more questions of his to Rahul Gandhi I kept looking at that and I said look at the magnificent impact of a digital medium be easy and simple language Three communicating with a generation who would not have talked about Raphael in any case and fourth. It's gone global So I have often looked at these moments and I want this panel to maybe think about the fact that Digital as a medium whether it's that two-minute video on Raphael or the Shot of somebody in New York at a Samosa party conveys much more than traditional advertising So when we are now doing our launch to Bharat, it is almost I can confidently tell you 95% digital marketing content creation that we are doing on our own Focusing on the centrality of the message we want to send on Bharat The nature has changed your lines have changed people are informal And I think it lasts for much longer than traditional advertising So I'm a big proponent of it and I just wanted to use these two examples as conversation starters Thank you for sharing that And that'll be music to the ears of eight digital agencies and densuages network and the several partners who Practice digital out here and thanks for sharing that which are over to you As a managing director of bliss, which is incidentally a geo-targeting based Digital product I should say in that sense. You have a very different world view than what we do in India You're coming in from a market, which is Perhaps in some ways more digitally evolved than India is but then in some ways maybe has less skill sets than what India does Certainly lesser scale many of the markets that you work in. What is your view when you look at it out? From outside in what do you see happening in India? Which is a potential or which is different or something else that we should be doing in the context of businesses Digitally transforming themselves Okay, thank you. She's yes. You're right. So one of my first visits To Mumbai was last month and what really really blew me away was all the OTT content That's being produced here locally with Netflix producing 400 pieces of content is absolutely fantastic No market that I'm in in the Mina region. We don't have so much content I mean only 3% of content online is Arabic So there's a real challenge around content creation content production and how consumers then can gain information by the internet Now India has the absolute opposite problem. There's great talent here great opportunities To work with very very intelligent smart people that are coming out of universities And they're really working hard. So me in a region. Yeah, we do have a talent deficit And that's because of you know, a lot of it is because the education system lack of The relevant degrees to put them into the new working places India doesn't have that at all. So it was a very positive experience now bliss We've seen the opportunity. There's a question earlier that came from the audience is how do outside companies outside of India? European companies American companies how they're finding the growth of India and the opportunities there are here So we're a company that's 14 years old and we've always been in the location space providing Brands advertisers company with incredible audience data and mass movement data And what they do with that data then enables them to shape their business on how they target audiences How they target their consumers and segment their consumers? so we see India as being a huge market opportunity for someone like bliss where Consumers are so connected the the 400 devices 400 million devices that you have here We connect to about 180 million devices in the MENA market. So the opportunity to work with advertisers And we work with huge advertisers like JLR across of the board We haven't started working them here So we're hoping to get them on board and provide them with use cases for the opportunity to use geo location technology and Data to shape the businesses and how the brands work with us is going to be really exciting for us Thank you. Thanks for sharing that Joy over to you and thank you first of all from flying in from all the way from London. It's a little pleasure absolute pleasure we are Heading towards our elections. No one knows that better than Arnab does and Facebook in the context of elections has been in the news sometimes for good reasons and sometimes not and I think It is a fact that rightly wrongly Digital is going to play a significant Role almost in the formation of governments or in the facilitation of that. How does Facebook look at it? I'm sure you guys have grappled with the good of it and the bad of it and How do you see the Indian elections because that's really the eyes are going to be on digital medium in that sense Absolutely, and it's something that we take very very seriously and have done for the last Obviously for the last couple of years To the extent by the end of this year, we'd have focused on probably nearly 50 elections last year There were the the Indian State elections or the mid-term elections Brazilian presidency. This is this is the big one This is the election, which is the the largest democracy in the world And there are a number of things that we're doing to make sure that there is an integrity to these elections First of all, there is that element of how do we fight fake accounts those accounts that come up that Then create some content nefarious content that can sent throughout our platform We're doing a lot on that every single day over a million accounts are turned off or blocked We sweep every day via AI but also via people as well to ensure those that content doesn't get within our platform Another interesting part everyone talks about it false news fake news Very very important that we combat that and we learn from election after election What are we doing? What are we doing around fake news? First of all, it's about education. What do we what we found is the particularly MPs their staff electoral chief election officers chief ministers They come under a lot of pressure and there is the chance that their accounts themselves could be hacked So we are doing education We're a cyberguides to all of these people to say this is what to look out for This is what to to ensure look at the signals to ensure the integrity of your sites And with that we also move into we're looking at third-party fact-checking very very important check the facts For example we use a relationship with AFP So these are the things that we're doing but one of the key things is when it comes to actual traditional marketing getting our message out To the public for them to understand. This is what misinformation is This is what you need to look out for and therefore This is what you can do about it and in particular There's gonna be campaigns as we get into the elections in the press in the dailies and what's apps can be very very important We've just discussed how amazing it is how it can connect But particularly, you know, we want it what's up to be safe secure and reliable and that's an absolute Must for the elections. So there's a number of things that we're doing that you probably know in the in India that you can only forward to now five groups We're in a position now where if there is a media Article you can't forward it immediately. There's lots of things that we're doing around WhatsApp But we want to make sure that is safe secure reliable for the election and one other thing which is again We're learning from traditional media If you now want to do a political ad You need to we're increasing ads transparency. So you know how to tell us and get authorized To run those ads we need to know who you are but also very important when you look at previous elections We need to know where you are. Are you from India? Are you from this from that particular state? And then and only then where we authorize you and then there's an opportunity for our community There'll be an ad registered you're able to see every single ad that that political party or organization has run So we're learning And we're learning fast one of the key things is you have to learn fast and we need to stay ahead of the bad actors We hope we do that Thanks He touched on a very important part of fake news. I think Definitely digital has significant advantages But one of the areas so far at least in India where the traditional media has had an advantage is that I think relatively speaking They've been less plagued by fake news whether it is print or it is Television unfortunately digital that hasn't been the case. Hopefully we learn and we learn fast like Facebook is saying Do you see that as a problem for digital or do you see that? Permeating all media including television at some stage. See I have a slightly different take on it I believe that fake news is a big problem. There's no doubt about it. But the fact is that Now global giants like Facebook are handling the situation with their backs on the wall Their backs are to the wall. They're defensive They're on the defensive. So they have to put up hoardings all across the London subway saying we're against fake news We are doing this against fake news on a daily basis. We are fighting fake news It's essentially because of things like Cambridge Analytica stuff like that which has dented the credibility of Facebook or and any Other global major would then say that, you know, the entire posturing Please don't mind my saying it a joy of Facebook is extremely defensive Extremely defensive on fake news fake news is a problem But you don't need an advertising campaign to fight fake news that seems to me like you're cleansing your conscience Almost saying that listen. We are not doing it. Let me present the situation very differently. I think Digital should be an agent of social change and transformation But a defensive digital medium cannot be the source cannot be an agent of social change and transformation And that's what I told you know when when you know this the marketing genius you should have invited him here today He's the greatest marketing genius in the country called Arvind Kejriwal. You should have invited him because truly And he also is by the way one of the greatest exponents of fake news Because he swore in my interview to him that I will I will you know jump off a building, but I'll never join politics Exactly what that other fellow who wants a civil war called Jignesh Mewani said also before becoming an MLA That's fake news, but on a serious note. Let me say one thing. Let me put a slightly provocative question How did Nirbhaya start So Ajay, this will be interesting You know, I could throw this at Ajay back that in in after the after the gang rape of 2012 There were Twitter hashtags hashtag deli gang rape Hashtag stop this ship hashtag deli protests hashtag Nirbhaya Hashtag Dominic and all these hashtags were galvanizing these protests Against a case of rape and there was one tweet Ashish by one 19-year-old One tweet by one 19-year-old, which I have the details here led to more than 1700 people that the tweet of that 19-year-old said illegally being held at Parliament Street police station with 15 other women terrified please RT and this tweet was Forwarded by 1,700 people and according to FAFTA, which is a social media analytics site within 10 minutes It reached 200,000 people that one tweet led to six days of street protests Believe me today Twitter would not have the guts to let such retweeting happen Believe me an Anna Hazare campaign, which we then did I remember people said we were activists when the Campaign against corruption happened. We fought against corruption for six months Ajay broke five scams after which the marketing team called India against corruption came and tried to galvanize attention on it Which is why I've said freely at that Kiran Bedi, Yogendra, Prashant Bhushan and Arvind Kejriwal and even Mr. Anna Hazare had no contribution in the fight against corruption We fought against corruption But when they made the India against corruption thing we backed them and it became a hashtag and then again Almost for four days the government was brought to a standstill It was possible because at that point of time Facebook Twitter all the others were not taking a defensive posture today today you do a campaign and Facebook and Twitter will first go and explain themselves It's not only in India globally Facebook Twitter all the big global digital media giants have their backs to the wall because their own Credibility is being questioned that are being asked. Did you sell your data? Did you give your data away and they are because they are giving all these Senate briefings and they're going to every country and we Giving congressional briefings. They already got their backs to the wall. So my the sadness in my heart is over the fact that Digital which could not just be a good marketing tool, but also an agent of social change It is perhaps a reality which will not happen people ask me Why do you put out tweets every day on your show? Do you need it? I don't but I enjoyed the sense of virality of a conversation But with regulations being put in you can only WhatsApp to five people so that you know You're not spreading a bad message You're on always putting ads on fake news you're not in a position to consolidate social change and I think that's where one fundamental responsibility of the digital medium is being lost and You're safeguarding your business interests, but you're not safeguarding your social obligations. So it's a it's a Double-edged sword in that sense Look, it's it's a very valid point and I think one of the things that we've realized in the last 12 months or so Is the great responsibility that we have and with that responsibility? We take that very Cautiously and wisely what we do next And so for some reasons it may be seen that we are over cautious But right now we would prefer to be in that place So we can understand more what is happening to our platform or more importantly What are these bad actors doing and what can we do to? Decrease them, but at the same time what can we do to ensure that free speech is still something that happens on our platform And others as well. It is an interesting time But it is a great time of responsibility for us as well Thank you a joy to quickly get you off the mat because you have no idea when Arnab starts on it where it can lead Let me let me let me change the topic totally I enjoy I've been warned by many cousins and my mother they told me exactly what to expect Let me let me then ask you a personal question. You told me that you're coming to India after 15 years Right. I mean two things were different one was that Arnab Goswami was not that well known then and The other bit was that digital wasn't as big Then as it is now, is there anything else that you feel is different about Mumbai after 15 years? Well You know, that's I find it fascinating. I've actually been coming since 1980 1983 all the way through to this time So I was describing to all of the cricket tours that I remember seeing come over here One of the good things is is that India and our beating Australia. So that's a that's a that's a change Look, it's always been an entrepreneurial city and also one of the things that I find fascinating as I'm very fortunate to travel the world Is that it's a it's a very young? City and I think it's a very young country and that has so much energy and that ability to The cultural change that the young people can have they they want to question people and it's not about hierarchy It's about who's got the best idea and those are the sort of businesses that I'm seeing Not just in Mumbai, but I can sense in other parts of India But that attitude is it's the thing that's gonna continue India's growth. I think it's very very exciting Just seeing that attitude of challenging Hierarchy it's not about hierarchies about the right idea and it's about collaboration We see that younger generation are all about collaboration I think some of those older generations in the more traditional industries I'm not going to talk to that person in their own business. Let alone a competitor, but in this world I think the attitude needs to be how can you what is the best thing you can do for the customer? And who do we need to partner to make that happen? Thanks I know there are two things that you said which actually resonated very much with what Rajan and Vivek were discussing before Clearly they said that vernacular and voice amongst the three things and of course video are going to be big in some ways, you're at the cusp of all three right video is in a sense what built you and your channel You're now about to launch a Hindi channel which takes you into vernacular and in a sense gives you a much bigger Much bigger platform I would say because at the end of the day English does have a limitation on that and the third thing is voice You spoke about dictating that and that having a very different tone So clearly we are seeing this as a common theme that video voice and vernacular is going to be the way forward for Digital is that going to impact television? Communication or is that only going to be around digital? Are you seeing some changes in those areas in the years to come? So right now we are getting for example into a into the biggest and most competitive Distribution market in the country, which is Hindi news So over the last one month, I have been traveling from Ludhiana, Bhatinda, Udaipur, Jabalpur UP, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, I'm going to go to Bihar. I'm really excited and wherever we are going We are meeting people so there's a handshake and everyone says best of luck So we asked them why you're going to back us. They said, you know, you you represent a Feeling that India can you know, you believe in the country. I said it's I believe in the country So we called it Republic Bharat Rashtra Kinam and that's our slogan So one is that when you go into a market, I always believe one thing about the Indian market Ashish This is a market Ajay, which is not just entrepreneurial as you said it is perennially Greenfield You know 25 years from now if Republic becomes one big Giant company there will still be somebody out there who can individually come and challenge it It is a Greenfield country in its spirit you know and That is the beauty of this country where you generally feel you can move mountains You know, so if I for example just came in I was just telling someone five weeks back I had two million reach in Hindi. I penetrated after five weeks. We've gone and got our report We have 130 million penetration already, which is available and running right as a as a free to HR So what is the beauty of this country as a nature? As far as Language is concerned. We are slowly becoming accent agnostic. Let me explain this I don't know what accent I speak Hindi in a mix of as a means beats Bengali means what I don't know, but I speak Hindi and My accent in Hindi doesn't matter. I can speak it with a Bihari accent I can speak with UP accent I can speak it with a South Indian accent people are getting into cognitive understanding and Therefore way as a complex country. We are becoming a more homogenous country where we forgive accents like you know when I always say I studied in a Kendra Vidyalaya, so I say I speak English with a Kendra Vidyalaya accent. I didn't go to Dune school I don't need to pretend so Dune school accent is not required in India today Kendra Vidyalaya accent is acceptable Indian team changed because Virat Kohli did not go to Dune school Believe me if he went to Dune school, he'd be playing ping-pong by now The the the question is this as a competitive and yet complex country. We are becoming forgiving and accepting of each other So I have two options People ask me what when you do Hindi what will happen people are taking it as a certainty will be successful That also puts a lot of pressure, but suppose we do Hindi. What will we do next? Somebody yesterday asked me were recruiting someone I said, you know what there's so much vernacular. I'm going to go global And I think I want to answer your question on voice and the other issues and you said that you see You mentioned puja that you when you come you see a lot of OTT believe me six months back There was no content being created. It's a compulsion of the business that is content is being created for that It's out of compulsion, but at the same time it's organically happening We have to be the content capital of the world Ashish Only we can be for three reasons one. We are accent and language agnostic We are genuinely we are When I started times now, I keep saying I had people from 12 nationalities because we got Chris a hun and of Reuters to invest 26 percent at times now and So the deal was that he will send 40 nationalities people to train here So people from New York Dubai everybody came I trained them in lower parallel including in the form of local abuse But but the fact is they integrated into my newsroom and I kept saying that if I can and the guy I trained is now the global editor of CNN digital So I said if at least he was till couple of years back So I said if he could do that and I trained him. Why can't I be the global capital of the world? We can create fiction nonfiction and news and We can create video we can create audio we can create print But the most exciting option for Indians as genuine content creators is create video content language agnostic Create the content globally, but curate it in India Because when you curate that content locally, you are curating it at 10% of the cost that you would in London or New York 10% of the cost of a vice as Good quality, so I think the next challenge for us is to say that we playing the Indian game We have a proud to have 800 900 channels Can there be one channel one digital platform one content creation company one OTT platform some of the content being created is Fabulous fabulous that film Uri is fabulous It also tells me that you can create a film like that and only give it a different social cultural context You can problem is we are right now limiting ourselves to our geography Because my nature Indians are not culturally expansionist and we believe that if we people laugh at me I said that listen I can get you the story on Trump quicker and faster than anyone else. They laugh at me, but believe me you can We just have to have the confidence. So I think next step Ashish Using digital step beyond the geography of India Create a bunch of super confident Indian professionals Start creating global content companies out of India Not global content companies with one base in India No create a global content company from India, which we are going to do by the end of 2019 when Republic expands and does the digital Global game, but there are many others who can also do it and we can create many Bloomberg's and many CNN's out of this Soil and this is the beautiful time to do it No, I'm a very Nationalistic India believer and my my team knows that my children know it But I really feel small when I listen to you because you take it up to a different level So I believe in it Ashish. I have evangelized this. I believe in it. You know Ashish when I met you people said Why did you start Republic? I said I only wanted to be financially stable and independent, but I don't want to do that I think it is your and my response to people in the room You asked them right now would you be proud if today not a republic or any company would play a global game and And would center out and create content for Singapore, New York. You can do it If or not go so we can speak Hindi you can do anything So, you know my point is that we can play the global game And I think some of those OTT players are just dying to go global And I think they will do it in the next one or two years And I use that as a challenge to my team sitting here the denser ages network team sitting here that we've got to go Now and not look at India Of course, we are going to capture that but we got to now look at the world. So and now this is our nubs words It's gonna happen Pooja over to you You know We when we are in India and some of us are very passionate about it You saw how I know was I know I am many of my colleagues are we're very very passionate about it And we sometimes tend to see more of the good and the opportunity But we also miss out the fact that it's actually a very difficult country for somebody coming from outside to do business in in many ways Without being polite, can you tell us that somebody coming from outside in trying to do business here? What are the big difficulties? What are the problem areas that you face which which India should look at and probably address it differently? Not just in digital marketing, but overall I'm Indian Right. We're Indian. So we speak the same language. We have the same mindsets A joy is exactly the same as me So we already have a great template to enter the marketplace and it's probably one the reasons why I was given the responsibility to cover Indian because I understood the marketplace here and You know my mom worked at BA British Airways were younger and every single summer from the age of five years old She took advantage of the fact that she had very low cost tickets and sent us to Delhi Every single year for about 15 years until we said enough's enough mom We've had enough of Delhi so it gave me a very very strong template of What it means to be Indian and how to conduct yourself in business within family environments and how to shop Right. So bargaining really I learned that from coming for my holidays here Now when you come as an outsider and coming in so last month I was here and one of two of our VPs came along with me and it's the first time that they've been to India to do business and They're English and one of the things that they found really difficult was They couldn't get a word in edge ways. Sorry on They couldn't get a word in edge ways so they had to really understand the business Was that on a show or in general? Oh, I don't know definitely wasn't on a show I don't think they'll be able to a catch up with our move of that speed, but I'm trying to get in a word in edge ways and really understand how to Exchange information so it was very one way one way one way It'll be great when you know they come back again, and they've learned now They've just got to listen they come here, and they've just got to listen And it gives them a it gives them great insights right in the region here What's fascinating is? Uber Uber was fantastic here They came in and they could just get ubers everywhere and they're based in London, right? So you know the issues that Uber have had in London with the government and here It's just an open economy is to it's easy to do business if you get it Right if you know the right people, it's easy to do business if you're open-minded It's easy to do business you can't bring in your European mindset your American mindset and expect to do Business in the same fashion it works very differently. It's very relationship driven. It's very respectful It's very very intelligent, right? So you really need to swat up on what you're going to be talking about and who are you going to be talking to? When you're coming to India So a lot of it is more cultural as she's then Than anything else. Thank you, Pooja. I think you're absolutely right We also need to listen more because we do talk a lot Joey One question to you. I mean it is undoubtable that India is a very very important market for many multinational companies I'm pretty sure for Facebook. It's one of the large markets and you probably see a lot of growth coming from India While that is recognized and that's probably true for Google That's probably true for LinkedIn and probably true for 50 other companies. I can think of but While that is true We still see everything invented in the West and brought in into India and that's not necessarily the best for us And I don't mean Facebook as an example, but in general, right? That may not be most apt everything that works in New York or California or London need not necessarily work as well in Mumbai or Better still in Merot. Correct. So when will multinational companies? Digital companies start recognizing and realizing that it's time that they invented and created products in India Which then has what are numbers saying probably might one day go out, but create products for this market Do you think that's a problem? Look, I think This is India's time. That's one of the things that we know Even in the region where are two big players in the region, but we believe India is the one that It has the future and it's got a dynamism to it and I suppose when I look at it It's about confidence the confidence that you show is I think the confidence that needs to be shown by the business community Not to ask why did these things happen? Just make it happen. Do it the other way have that that drive to understand that you are Indians this Mumbai business community as good if not better than anywhere else so make it happen I think that's and I think that's gonna be there. I Can see that confidence. I can see that confidence here. I can see that confidence on the cricket field It's this is the time just be confident and make it happen is what I'd say Thank you. Ajoy At the last year I asked you this question and you had one answer I'm gonna try and see if anything has changed on that At the end of the day while digital is very important all of that You're essentially have been built your channel and you on television, right and even today I'm sure a lot of your revenue or most of your revenue probably comes in that's where that's what brings the bacon home so to speak But you do realize that digital is where it is going to be maybe two years five years ten years from now because You're one of the smartest businessmen I've met and you clearly will recognize that. How are you balancing that? This is building you but that's where the future is Thank you. I think that's that's this very important. Thank you for asking me that question Because my faith in TV does not mean I have any contempt for digital at all We have today out of our roughly about 750 or 800 people at Republic I'm happy to say that We would have about you know about a hundred To maybe now by next year another hundred and fifty So we would be one of the larger employers and digital so we would have about a hundred fifty to two hundred people in digital including including People who are working on product in a deeper way with content So there are two innovations I'm doing so let me then take you since you asked me straight I'll just give the answer with what my business strategy is and I'm very transparent about it I have nothing to hide I Do TV because television breaks even quickly with a successful product As a content guy, I create the product product is accepted We distribute it aggressively and we get the advertising for it. We break even so that's been a simple philosophy in TV in Digital what we have done Ashish is that we have started where the first TV Broadcasting house to have a large large Engineering and product presence out of Bangalore So I built a third office a fourth fourth office, which is based out of Bangalore Which only does which is only tech so we have taken a decision to do our own tech and On the basis of our innovations we built a joy you'd like this We will build homegrown the lightest news app in the world Which is like maybe 2.5 MB really light And and and we were really happy when we did it that we didn't outsource the engineering to anyone else So we have really strong digital people ready Then we've done a new experiment which we call a content production combined team experiment We broke the walls between people who understood product Which means people who understood how the message was to be communicated with people who were doing the message and Yesterday we had a meeting for Bharat 27 people from the content production team came in and said said tell us the message and we take over the Dissemination and then we tell the tech team in Bangalore how to create ways in which it can be disseminated So right now I'm investing in digital to expand the brand appeal of Republic and Republic Bharat But by about April or May this year once Republic Bharat is true We're gonna really mushroom this digital team and and it's my investment into the future We will go completely vernacular on digital. We'll have digital in many languages and then we'll go global. So, yes I am strongly investing Yes, we are happy to lose money on digital a little money not a lot of it But but but we're happy to lose money on digital at this stage as an independent business Not because we want to give it crutches But because we believe that by 2020 the time will come where we will be able to merge our broadcast business in a More direct way with our digital business till then. It's like a leap of faith. It's our love for digital Which is taking us through so I'm a great believer in it and It's the way we will go global So I have great affection for digital because I can't go to the US market with content on cable and satellite But I can certainly go it and go on digital. So, yeah, we've been at the front end Just want to follow this up by saying we did tie-ups with Microsoft when Satya Nadella was here Then we tied up with them. We I met Satya We were the first ones to convert to the usage of Azure We've been experimental on every platform. I met the head of LinkedIn here We had a partnership with LinkedIn our entire recruitment was via LinkedIn So we're very non-traditional and I use of the digital medium so far Fantastic great to hear. I think with that we are running out of time. Perhaps there is time for one or two questions So if anybody has a question in the audience, please put your hand up and yep. Yeah Somebody get the mic or maybe you can shout through till then Yeah Hi, yes, sir My question would be to Anup What do you think now with the elections coming up? How important do you think will digital play in the entire thing versus your traditional media It'll play enormous enormous number For example, we had roughly 20 million video view minutes during the last Assembly election now if we match our linear it's a television and non-linear feeds We put it together the most amazing statistic action is we had more people watching our Content on digital than watching it on TV They I should not be saying it because then people would say you give the digital advertising rates on TV I will not say it but what I'm saying is it's a fabulous thing So when Vikas Kanchandani some of you may know him a brilliant guy. He's our CEO. He showed me this number I said because impossible. He said it's true. I said you're you're faking it It is true Are you saying that more people watched us on digital already and then I said did we do any marketing? Did we do anything or in organ we did nothing in organic and one more thing? I tell you I have never bought a single like as a matter of ethics I don't buy audiences the one thing I'd say to you never buy inorganic reach To many of our competitors including the big media houses were getting desperate that so many people read them on the paper But they have to show that people watch them. I found out I won't name the organization one of India's biggest media houses is buying truckloads of viewership I don't know why to fool advertisers to go back to them and say people watch the snow inorganic reach when people like you They'll come to you automatically So yes, I'm very excited and I think this time in this election twice as many people will watch us on digital compared to TV Inorganically, okay, so that means you would say the digital platform or the medium is Better than your traditional TV in terms of when it comes to marketing It's apples and oranges. You see I'll tell you one small answer. Don't compare it If someone tells me today if digital is not monetizable, should you not make the effort to get that reach? No, you should It's both audiences are different Just because today there is no advertising matrix that gets into digital doesn't mean it won't happen in the future So I think both are high quality audiences nature of viewing is different when you're watching TV when you're watching my show You're watching it with a family in a conversation when you're when you're seeing me It's a more singular experience. So both are beautiful both in terms of content and viewing experience Thank you so much. I think we'll take one last question if anybody has a quick. Yes, sir You guys decide Okay, quick, but then a short question, please. Hi. I'm Kumaris. My question is for Aruna There are two points firstly being on digital people broadcast themselves They have their own opinion and being on television you give the opinion you actually broadcast yourself to many a lot of people These are two points now We have been seeing many media houses who are ideologically driven Many media houses the ideologically driven so don't think it's a conflicting For these two pillars like they get me make it expose or something like this cell has having no own voice and Ideological driven media is having no own voice. So can there be some conflict in these two things? See, it's not one or two. Everybody has an opinion Some disguise it some don't simple answer Do you believe the Hindu does not have an opinion? The Hindu newspaper has an opinion of its own Republic has an opinion of its own people read too much into it Now I believe I come from a world where I'm not embarrassed or ashamed to have an opinion I'm not going to go into the studio tell my reporters yesterday. We did a meeting. Let me answer your question differently I met all my anchors for the Hindi channel. They said was what would you like us to do in the Hindi channel? I said unleash yourself You represent a new be wave of journalists in this country. Don't be squeamish about your opinion Ideological differences are not the right word perspectives will be different Each perspective does not transform into an ideology. Ideology is a much more all-encompassing thing. You're a leftist. You're a rightist That's not We have a right to have our opinion and I think that does not The audience is smart enough to discriminate for themselves Secondly also consider sometimes I force my opinion to provoke you to give yours Hence I become a higher engagement medium As long as I'm not I don't have any selfish interest or financial interest in doing it. I think it's fine Hi, I know my name is Abhinav. I'm a journalist and on this startup calls three journals The problem of fake news as we know today Well, this problem existed even in the pre-medieval times But as we know today as a journalist Do you think the problem will be solved through technology or do you think that people themselves feel collectively come to an understanding that? fake news exists and Eventually it will depend on a knowledge of people which one do you think will drive more in the second one, you know I think self-regulation is better Technologically a joy is in a better position to tell you and you know, they are doing their best with things like artificial intelligence to localize But you know, eventually there's nothing that beats the human mind in terms of identifying fake news and and Just the awareness that fake news exists itself in my view Holds it back So I become more conscious Simply to tell you one thing. I'll answer this differently today one factual inaccuracy. You know one day in the course of my debate I Mispronounced or misspelled the name of the father of the nation. So it's just saying Moondas Karamchand Gandhi is it? Karamchand Gandhi I said something wrong that got retweeted like a million times like we got you or no You know, you don't know your stuff You cannot make a factual mistake and if if you lie, you'll be caught So I think because viewers are so aware. I When we were in college, we were not as politically aware. We became politically aware after Mandal Today's people are more politically aware. The problem today is opinion without fact So that's also a danger But yes, fake news will go with through regulation of a very aware and august audience You can't fool people nowadays. Thank you. Thank you. I think with an interesting panel like this We can just go on and on but we have to bring this panel to an end Let me really thank Pooja Ajay and of course Arnab for a fantastic panel. Give them a big hand ladies and gentlemen Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you so much for that interview