Big TV in Talks with Carlyle & Providence for Funds

Further to Big TV's talks to sell stakes to private equity firms, Carlyle Group and Providence Equity have emerged as the front runners to clinch the deal.

According to reports, Deutsche Bank has been authorised to facilitate the deal and Big TV is looking to divest about 20% of which 10% will be sold now for around US$ 50-75 million. A senior official from Reliance said that Big TV needed between Rs 1500 to Rs 2000 crore for its expansion purpose.

While Government norms allow 49% foreign investment in DTH, it restricts FDI in a DTH operator at 20%, so Big TV is most likely to dilute its equity in stages.

Big TV is on an expansion spree. The company is also in talks with general entertainment channels such as Colors, Star Plus, Sony and Zee TV to acquire broadcast rights for some of their popular television shows.

Also in the offing is an aggressive ad campaign across TV, print, online and radio stations. Currently, Big TV has around 1.8 million subscribers, and is the third biggest player in the DTH market, after Dish TV and Tata Sky.

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Big TV Launches Aggressive Ad Campaign

As part of its 360 degree marketing approach Big TV has decided to advertise with not only with the top 15 radio stations in the country covering 10,000 radio spots, but also carry out an intensive television, print advertisements and online promotion in a bid to promote its DTH service.

The 360 degree campaign is to promote the message of Big TV as a one-stop entertainment source in India in the next two months. According to the company they offer more channels, more movies and more interactive services than any other DTH provider.

Big TV is in talks with Radio Mirchi, Radio City, Red FM, Big FM, Radio One, Club FM and Surya FM. This is not new to Reliance Big TV as the company has done nearly 12 campaigns on radio since its launch in August 08.

15 - 25% of the advertising budget has been allocated towards radio, most of the radio campaigns target tier II and tier III cities.

Philip Jose, sales head, Club FM, Kerala, recalls, "Last year, we had major activations while Big TV was launching in the market. The activations were divided into pre launch, launch and post launch phases and many contests giving away free subscriptions were conducted. We are in talks with Big TV for their recent campaign and will finalise soon.”

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