Mumbai: Video streaming platform Zee5 has announced the launch of 'India Ka Binge-a-thon,' a three-day campaign to celebrate its fourth anniversary between 12 and 14 February.
This initiative is aimed at the platform’s long-standing goal of entertainment inclusion where consumers will get access to the top premium web series and movies across languages for three days for free.
Titles such as "Uri: The Surgical Strike" and "Abhay" in Hindi, "Mulshi Pattern" in Marathi, "Lalbazaar" in Bangla, "Geetha Govindam" in Telugu, "Ka Pae Ranasingam" in Tamil, "Madhura Raja" in Malayalam, and "Kalidasa Kannada Meshtru" in Kannada, amongst a host of others, will be freely available as a part of the celebratory offer.
Also in store for the upcoming event is another offering called ‘Zee5 Spark,’ which in partnership with Indie producers and digital content creators, aims to bolster the platform’s AVOD content library. ‘Spark’ has been launched to attract new viewers, especially the youth, onto the platform for a long-term duration with short films and web series that are free to stream.
“With OTT growing in prominence, content consumption got democratised, paving the way for creators to explore and expand the narrative with newer concepts and genres that have led to several consumer cohorts consuming differentiated content on the platform," observed Zee5 CCO Hindi originals Nimisha Pandey. "Factors such as the shift in demand for authentic stories, the success of women-centric narratives, growth of family entertainment, genre-bending shows and acceptance of characters with multiple layers and shades have ushered in many industry firsts in content.”
In addition to popular series such as "Holiday," "Ready 2 Mingle," "Dude," "The Great Indian Wedding," and "Happily Ever After," short films like "Baarish Aur Chowmein," "Half Full," "Khujli," "Kheer" and others, starring popular actors Taapsee Pannu, Naseeruddin Shah, Anupam Kher, Neena Gupta and Jackie Shroff will be available for AVOD users under Spark.
Over the past 12 months, Zee5 has become the highest growing OTT platform in India as per AppAnnie’s latest industry report. The platform claims to have 101.9 million monthly active users (MAU) and 9.6 million global daily active users (DAUs) as of December 2021. Zee5 users watched an average of 201 minutes of content per month during the last quarter, with the platform releasing 51 shows and movies, including 11 originals during the period
“We are entering our fourth year with great enthusiasm and vigour, riding high on the last one year which has been a blockbuster," said Zee5 India CBO Manish Kalra. "The response from the last four years of our operations has been phenomenal as we trotted into new markets, partnered with industry stalwarts, introduced many firsts and moved a little closer to our goal of deeper regionalisation and entertainment inclusion.”
“This year is going to be even bigger and better as we expand our content library further with premium offerings, improve our user experience, activate more value-driven partnerships, and set new industry standards. As the multilingual storyteller of India and Bharat alike, we will continue to focus on entertainment inclusion by producing relatable and entertaining content, keeping our diverse audience in mind,” he further added.
