 As you can already see, we have with us Mr. Girish Menon, partner in head media and entertainment, KPMG, who will be talking about the online gaming landscape in India. Very warm welcome to you, Mr. Menon. Hi, Cathy. Thank you so much. Hello, everybody. Just give me a second until I share my screen please. Thank you so much, Cathy. And hello, everybody. And welcome to this session on the online gaming summit. I'm very excited to be here and talk to you guys about our perspective on the online gaming landscape in India. This is a space that is something that we are tracking very, very closely. And it's a space that we've started to see explored over the last few years or so. And it's very interesting to see the continuous number of triggers that keep coming up, which seem to be driving sustained growth in the space. I mean, post the 4G and the smartphone evolution, we saw a big bump up in the user space for online games in India. And during the COVID period, this was probably one of the very few sectors which actually saw an increase in user base and user engagement. And I'll talk about that in a bit. We are also seeing a fairly robust and continued interest from investors, both private and public. And this also hopefully will all go well for solving some of the challenges around capital constraints for the sector. So what I want to do today is use this session to very quickly take all of you through some of the more basics and some key aspects around online gaming in India. And let me start with literally gaming one on one. So what is really gaming? When we talk about gaming, what do we really actually mean? And there are obviously many contexts around this. And where does what fit in? So what we've tried to do is pull together a wide landscape which sort of covers the various elements around gaming in India. So gaming at a very overall level when you split it out into devices. So you've got console and PC at one end. And then you've got mobile online gaming as the other play in India. And within all of this, when you then break it down further into what are the business models or categories of games that exist. So you've got casual gaming. You've got real money games. And you've got eSports with sort of piggybacks on the overall ecosystem. Casual game in India is actually probably has got the largest subset of users with 380, 400 million users currently. Whereas RMG in terms of the user base is comparatively smaller. RMG itself has many components in it. And you've got fundamentally card games. You've got fantasy sports operators. And then you've got other skill-based games that sort of bring in. And that kind of a base for RMG ranges anywhere between 100 to 150 million users as it stands today. eSports, and we've heard SIE a little bit before also, is a space which is showing tremendous traction over the last year to two years or so. The number of players in the country are probably 80,000 plus, getting very quickly to about 100,000 players in the country. Viewers are already 40 million plus. And I think that gives a little bit of a confidence in terms of the depth of the user base that we are seeing in India. The other approach to also looking at online gaming in India is also the monetization models. So if you look at casual games fundamentally and interestingly and uniquely driven by advertising in India today, with paid models comprising purchase, paper download, and app purchases, which is a comparatively smaller share in India today. But globally, it's the predominant mode. And we are seeing a greater traction on paid models as we go along. On the real money gaming side, we've got commissioned revenue as the primary revenue model for most of the real money game companies with minimal advertising contribution also. And if you really pull it all together, and I think the other obviously key point and the reason why a lot of the emphasis for us is on online gaming. And within that on the casual gaming genre is fundamentally the fact that the majority of the users, almost 90% of the users in India play mobile games and almost all of them play casual games. So I think that's how we sort of look at the overall landscape and context for the Indian gaming segment. When you now convert that into numbers, what does that mean? So if you look at it, so gaming as a business as a segment has seen dramatic growth over the last five years from what was almost a 170, 180 million million users in FI-15, we are now close to 400 at the calendar year December 20 and we expect by another 18 months or so, we should be close to 500 million users in the country. And I think that is a significant scale-up that we are seeing on the gaming user base in India. On the other hand, when you convert that into numbers and into money, gaming is about $1.3 billion in FI-20 and we expect that to get to more than $2 billion in literally two years time frame. And again, Sai made the point that gaming tends to overshadow other entertainment segments as it grows in size. And this is perfectly true for a lot of the mature markets. And even in India, if you look at some of the more emerging segments and you compare that to gaming, so I mean, OTT is a classic example. Gaming is already a larger segment than OTT. And globally gaming actually tends to overshadow more traditional segments like even television. When you look at the Indian context, and I think this is where we need to look at the maturity curve for India in terms of monetization. Currently 60% of industry revenues are actually coming in from RMG, though casual is as a segment is what is expected to drive and grow revenues at a much faster pace as we go forward. When we then step back a second and look at, so we spoke about the landscape of the gaming segment, what is the value chain? What are the various companies about, what do they do, where do they fit in? So really, you can start with the developer, which is the game studio who either build a brand or an IP on their own, or they leverage existing IPs or brands. And then you've got the publisher who then picks up the studio, the IP, and then brands it, markets it, enables distribution at scale, and enables reach to the consumers, right? In a lot of developed markets, you will see the publishers and studios overlap with each other. When it comes to distribution and monetization, fundamental models tend to be, app store or online gaming stores or retail gaming stores, right? But uniquely what sort of, seeing a lot of traction in India as compared to a lot of other developed markets, is India is seeing the emergence of multi-gaming platforms, which then act as a mini universe of their own for consumers to engage and play games, and also direct downloads, and particularly, pushed through by the RMG and fantasy sports players. And that's also, that's also a model which has actually become very well established within the Indian ecosystem. So now, and I briefly mentioned this at the beginning, right? COVID was interestingly a trigger for gaming growth and increased interest in gaming over the last 12 months or so, right? I mean, we've seen, if you look at the last three quarters, right? Q1 to Q220, which is during the lockdown period, you saw almost a 50% growth in mobile game downloads, right? And interestingly, that's a number that actually sustained, right? So it's not that after lockdown, and this was a worry that people will pull back and there will be a reduction in gameplay. It's actually stabilized and we are actually now seeing in a lot of the gameplay, the user engagement metrics, as also the number of users and downloads either stabilize at similar levels as Q2 or maybe drop down a little, but still remain significantly higher to pre-COVID levels. So bringing all this together, right? Now, while all of this makes, is very interesting hearing and very interesting reading, I think there are three or four angles that we do need to keep in mind when you look at the Indian gaming industry. I mean, realistically, it is still a relatively much less mature industry, right? And it needs time before we can start seeing a significant growth curve continuing to come through, right? Particularly when it comes to monetization. While gaming has been around in India for ever literally, but it's literally post-4G, post-2016, where we saw large masses of users converge on the gaming ecosystem. And I think that maturity is something that we need to wait for. And that is also reflected partly in the ARPU levels, right? So India's casual gaming ARPU is, you know, pointed dollars as compared to $65 in the US, you know, sorry, $65 average globally. And that is a gap that we do need to bridge, so I think one very important thing to keep in mind is fundamentally globally, most markets evolved from console gaming and PC gaming, which created a culture of payment and a culture of high ARPUs, whereas India effectively leapfrogged that entire device generation, which is effectively meant that while you got a huge number of mobile users, getting them to be monetized is going to take a little bit longer. The other two or three angles around, you know, that need to be, you know, solved for as we move forward, is that, you know, from an Indian studio perspective, we, you know, we need to see more studios building at scale, building game titles which are comparable to the best in the world. And while we are, you know, on track, there is still a while to go around that. When it comes to regulatory, also there is, you know, a need for regulatory clarification and clarity in terms of the way forward for the wider gaming sector. And same with distribution and access, particularly given that there are restrictions around, particularly for RMG and OFS with respect to the Play Store or all this thing. So taking that forward, you know, just to, you know, link it back to the point I made around earlier around the maturity curve for India. India is still, you know, if you really look at it, you know, on the maturity index and the monetization index in the lower, you know, left-hand quadrant. Whereas there is still, and therefore, there is still a while to go, you know, before we can truly be comparable with the global markets. So while India has, is the second largest market in the world in terms of number of users, monetization still, there is a while to go. And, but like I said earlier, most of these other markets, we are comparing ourselves to our far more mature markets when it comes to gaming behavior. And I think India will see us get there and once we get some more, you know, sustained traction in terms of user engagement levels than user base, right? And they're already starting to see that traction happen, right? So if you look at, you know, television, for example, average TV time spent was four hours daily. On, in that comparison, when you look at video streaming, that's three, you know, three hours 42, but gaming is already three hours seven, right? And therefore we are already starting to see a gaming as a entertainment medium, catch up with more established traditional mediums with respect to vying for the time of the consumer, right? And as that share becomes larger and as their share becomes more sustained, you will also see the follow on effect on monetization. You know, and therefore, and from there, what I now want to just, you know, quickly touch upon are some of the key elements and trends that we've sort of seen and, you know, and the evolving areas that we are seeing around gaming in India, right? And, you know, Sai was there in the previous conversation at eSports about eSports. And, you know, beyond the point, not so much that I can add there, but I think two or three key elements that we need to keep in mind is, yes, you know, as the maturity of the gamers grows, as we see international recognition of eSports, particularly with the Olympic games and the Asian games, we will see greater amount of traction and greater depth in the ecosystem, you know, on the gamer side, right? But along with that ecosystem, it is also important that the brand ecosystem, the broadcast ecosystem, the viewer ecosystem also develops rapidly. And I think that's something that we are starting to see happen, right? As we go forward. But there are two or three key elements that we do need to solve for as we move forward, right? I think one of the points, you know, was mentioned earlier also is the device ecosystem. I think eSports is still largely driven through console and PCs and getting a larger share of mobile gamers to play eSports and to enable them to play eSports. Governments is actually gonna be very, very critical. The other angle that we also need to sort of keep in mind is that if you really step back and look at the titles and the publisher ecosystem for eSports in India, it is still very, very shallow in the sense that it is largely driven by a few titles. And there aren't any Indian titles that are sort of driving this ecosystem as of now, right? So I think getting more depth in the publisher ecosystem is also extremely critical for the wider health of the eSports market in India. And taking on from that, right? And you can sort of even partly marry the two, right? One of the triggers that we believe that could actually enable the mobile gamers to essentially leapfrog into console titles in a large way is actually the cloud gaming as a phenomenon, right? This is something that has been effectively launched globally over in a few markets over the last two to three years or so. There is still a while to grow. It is still a very nascent product. I think the product itself is undergoing iterations. People are trying to figure out what works, what doesn't work, and what needs to be sorted out, right? The supply is something that, you know, is also needs to be sort of built on from a cloud gaming service perspective, pricing, monetization, all of those are something that is still being figured out. But if you step back a second and look at what cloud gaming can mean for India, right? It essentially means that the entire console universe in theory becomes available to a mobile gamer and we've got 400 million of them, right? So as we, you know, you see more of these gamers being able to engage in more complex games, you will see a greater traction and maturity in the gaming universe in India, right? That being said, obviously there are angle aspects and challenges that needs to be sort of factored in and the key element among them will be the infrastructure requirements, right? Particularly with respect to high speed internet and the data requirements that exist today in terms of the kind of supply that is available on cloud game. But these are, you know, challenges which we believe will get resolved over time. And I think, you know, and cloud gaming is something that will have a significant impact on how gaming in India evolves as we move forward. The other key angle that, you know, a couple of other trends that we also wanted to, you know, sort of, you know, bring out one of the reasons that, you know, multiplayer games have done, you know, and many titles did well in India. As also we saw a significant ramp up during the COVID period was essentially the ability to engage socially through games, right? And social gaming is something that is seeing significant traction games, you know, through game streaming platforms, game community platforms, as also in-game social features, you know, through multiplayer gaming, voice chat, video chat, multilingual, you know, text chatting, all of that is essentially bringing a greater connectivity between the gamers and it effectively means that, you know, you are essentially playing with friends, with family, and that sort of is, you know, giving greater encouragement for gamers to spend time with their interests, right? So I think this is a space that we will see far more, you know, interesting developments happening around how do you engage more with gamers? How do you get gamers to engage more? And how do you really sort of build, you know, the ecosystem around social gaming as we move forward? So that, you know, in a nutshell, really was, you know, what we were trying to, you know, sort of articulate in terms of how we see the gaming ecosystem develop as it moves forward. And like I mentioned at the beginning, I think we are going to see significant traction in gaming both in terms of the user base, as well as monetization. Monetization might lag user growth by a couple of years, but like I had mentioned, gaming is still a relatively nascent market in India. And as that market evolves and becomes more mature, you will see significant opportunities for monetization also start coming in as we go forward. That really, you know, was briefly what I wanted to convey to you guys today. Hopefully you found this interesting. And with that, I would like to hand it over back to Khyati. Khyati, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you so much, Mr. Menon, for giving us that very detailed landscape of what gaming in India, in this industry looks like. Thank you so much for your time. And I'm sure all of you was all those enthusiastic gamers as well as gaming startups have taken some key takeaways from your session. Thank you very much once again. Happy doing it. Thank you.