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<ul><li><keyword id="128026" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Eros-International">Eros International</keyword> and <keyword id="9073081" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="STX-Entertainment">STX Entertainment</keyword> have recently merged to form a new entity, Eros STX Global Corporation.</li><li>The merged entity will have an increased economic scale of more than $600 million in pro forma revenue for calendar 2019 and over $300 million of aggregated future revenue from STX Entertainment films already released last year.</li><li><keyword id="354184" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Pradeep-Dwivedi">Pradeep Dwivedi</keyword>, CEO-India, Eros International Media Ltd. and <keyword id="281495" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ali-Hussein">Ali Hussein</keyword>, CEO, ErosNow throw some light on what the merger means and how it will help Eros International grow. They also tell us what's in it for the consumers.</li></ul> Eros International and STX Entertainment have recently merged together to create a ‘pre-eminent global media company which can develop, produce and distribute Bollywood and Hollywood premium content at scale and across many platforms of both the entities’. The combined entity will have the capability to take Eros's and STX's content libraries and pipeline of original content to a broad and growing global audience. The new entity has been named Eros STX Global Corporation. The organization has put together a management team led by <keyword id="190952" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Kishore-Lulla">Kishore Lulla</keyword> as Executive Co-Chairman, Robert Simonds as Co-Chairman &amp; Chief Executive Officer, Andrew Warren as Chief Financial Officer, <keyword id="2953806" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Rishika-Lulla-Singh">Rishika Lulla Singh</keyword> and Noah Fogelson as Co-Presidents, and <keyword id="8711638" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="prem-parameswaran">Prem Parameswaran</keyword> as Head of Corporate Strategy. In a recent conversation with Pradeep Dwivedi, CEO-India, Eros International Media Ltd. and Ali Hussein, CEO, ErosNow, we tried to decode what this merger will entail, how it will help both the entities grow and how users stand to gain. Edited excerpts: Q) Tell us a bit about the merger of Eros International and STX Entertainment. How will it help you grow your organization? Pradeep Dwivedi: The merger will help to create a pre-eminent global media company which can develop, produce and distribute Bollywood and Hollywood premium content at scale and across many platforms of both the entities. As part of this transaction, $125 million of incremental equity led by TPG, Hony Capital and Liberty Global will help boost our liquidity and maintain a healthy balance sheet. The merged entity will have an increased economic scale of more than $600 million in pro forma revenue for calendar 2019 and over $300 million of aggregated future revenue from STX Entertainment films already released last year. We believe that the combination can yield run-rate revenue and cost synergies of up to $50 million that can be achieved by the calendar year 2022. The main areas for synergy opportunities are around content creation and distribution as well as reducing overhead and our borrowing cost. The deal comes at a time when the entire movie production sector shut in major global markets due to the COVID-19 pandemic, will see STX merging into the NYSE-listed Eros International and creating an enterprise with a $1 billion valuation. We strongly believe that the combined forces of Eros and STX will be beneficial for our shareholders. Q) As a result of the merger, how do Eros's consumers stand to gain? Pradeep Dwivedi: The combined company will have a robust pipeline of feature-length films and episodic content with powerful, well-established positions in the world's fastest-growing global markets. Today, audience is looking for all-inclusive content across languages, formats and genres. This combined business model will, therefore, have the unique capability to present Eros's and STX's robust film and episodic libraries and pipeline of original content to a broad and growing global audience. The OTT platform – Eros Now will benefit from quality assets with STX for Eros Now Prime, which was recently launched and will showcase English content, starting with content from <keyword id="686589" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="NBCUniversal">NBCUniversal</keyword>. In addition, the merger will see developing international distribution in adjacent markets and creating potential global stories that could be best told on an OTT service. The content consumed through multi-year output deals and strategic alliances and the markets leading to Eros Now streaming platform. Q) Are mergers and partnerships like this the future of the OTT ecosystem? Ali Hussein: Eros Now has been on a strong growth trajectory over the last few years and now amassed 187 million registered users, and 26.2 million paid subscribers that come to us from 150 countries. A large part of the growth strategy for Eros Now is to launch sub-brands further like Eros Now Prime and others, and, further deep penetrate India. Also, developing our International presence to become a more glocal player in our adjacent markets. Organic growth and M&amp;A are all options we will consider based on the opportunity to be a relevant digital video brand to consumers in markets around the world. The newly created entity will leverage existing global partnerships with Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, NBCUniversal, Google and YouTube. Q) The combined company expected to generate approximately $50 million in run-rate operating synergies within 24 months of closing. Can you throw some light on this? Pradeep Dwivedi: There are significant synergy opportunities between Eros and STX which focus on content creation, distribution partnership as well as reducing overhead and our borrowing cost. Our emphasis would be on creating relevant content that has a global appeal and establish cross-over content partnerships with India and USA creative talent. This will thus help in substantially driving growth. While from a distribution point of view, the combined business will help in optimizing theatrical financing and create economic opportunities. Also, help in integrating Eros's theatrical release into STX's distribution agreement and help establish a direct theatrical distribution partnership, in addition, to bundle selling STX and Eros's programming to various network and streaming platform. The synergies also further help in enhancing and building their presence in the Chinese market, which is an upcoming entertainment market. The merger will also see co-production and co-financing Chinese as well as globally relevant content besides broadening Eros Now's proposition with western content and driving global subscriber growth. Q) What kind of global exposure will this merger help Eros International gain? Pradeep Dwivedi: There are approximately $50 million of highly actionable operating synergies across the global operations. These synergies can therefore monetize STX content on Eros’s OTT platform. This will be in addition to the recent announcement of Eros Now partnering with NBCUniversal and introducing a new format called Eros Now Prime. Eros Now Prime caters to premium English content programming majorly targeting the South Asian diaspora. Also, the OTT platform will benefit from STX quality assets, develop international distribution in adjacent markets and create potential global stories that could be best told on an OTT service. Furthermore, the merger will see Eros benefitting from STX global network, distribution agreements, partnerships, and STX's China relationship. Q) What kind of content offering can we expect from the new entity in the near future? Will this content be specific to each individual market? Ali Hussein: The merger creates the first truly independent media company that offers the best of Bollywood and Hollywood. STX's content slate caters to the massive and growing English content consumers in India. While Eros through its OTT platform will be offering original shows, short format content - Eros Now Quickie, music, Bollywood and regional language films that have a global appeal. The combined company expected to release close to 40 feature films in 2020 and more than 100 hours of original episodic content. Q) How will this step help fuel growth for Eros overall? What kind of growth expectations do you have for the current financial year? Ali Hussein: Synergies at the group level exist across efficiencies in content production, distribution expertise and penetrate offline audiences in US/India/China and ROW. Also, with the future of video technology and next-generation formats, new and exciting stories will be created that are more global in nature and bind the world with compelling cross border stories. The merger helps in leveraging the core premise of Indian entertainment for Eros Now and diversify into several sub-brands such as Eros Now Prime, Eros Now Quickie and other such formats by the end of FY 21. This will help Eros Now penetrate in India as well as global markets by offering glocal as well as Indian content respectively.

‘Eros International and STX Entertainment together can yield run-rate revenue and cost synergies of up to $50 million by 2022’

<ul><li>The first partnership for <keyword id="8950484" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="eros-now-prime">Eros Now Prime</keyword> is a strategic multi-year deal with NBCUniversal International Distribution.</li><li><keyword id="2480506" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Eros-Now">Eros Now</keyword> will soon layer an extensive English-language content offering consisting of over 2,000 hours of programming.</li></ul> Eros Now, the digital over-the-top (OTT) South Asian entertainment platform, has expanded its content strategy with the launch of ‘Eros Now Prime’. In an ambitious move to meet the ever-increasing demand for exemplary programming, Eros Now will soon layer the Eros Now base service with an extensive English-language content offering consisting of over 2,000 hours of programming. The first partnership for Eros Now Prime is a strategic multi-year deal with NBCUniversal International Distribution. As part of this agreement, Eros Now subscribers in South Asia will have seamless access to some of the most talked-about series from NBCUniversal, in addition to the existing Eros Now library, which is comprised of over 12,000 movie titles, original shows and music, as well as short-format content through Quickie, Eros’s short-format video content offering. A plethora of NBCUniversal TV titles will soon be available on the premium OTT platform for viewers to choose from: comedies such as the reboot of the critically acclaimed Will &amp; Grace and Four Weddings and a Funeral, which was based on the 1994 film; compelling dramas such as New Amsterdam, which stars Ryan Eggold (The Blacklist) and Anupam Kher; Belgravia which is from the award-winning creative team behind the global hit series, Downton Abbey; Devils, which stars Patrick Dempsey (The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair, Grey’s Anatomy) and Alessandro Borghi (The First King: Birth of an Empire); and Catherine the Great starring Helen Mirren, who was nominated for a Golden Globe® for her role in the series. Viewers will also be able to enjoy dramas such as Suits; Pearson, the spinoff of Suits; Temple; Bluff City Law; and Council of Dads. Eros Now is known as a Middle India product with deep penetration and distribution in Tier II and Tier III markets, with only Indian-language content as part of the platform. However, with the advent of Eros Now Prime, the brand is now poised to serve the global Indian citizen across metro cities and beyond. “With a growing focus on regional language and local content to cater to the next billion-user market, we are addressing users who increasingly view themselves as ‘global citizens’ and aspire to connect with places, people, and ideas beyond their locale. This will influence the persistence of English-language content, films, music consumption and networking on social media,” commented <keyword id="2953806" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Rishika-Lulla-Singh">Rishika Lulla Singh</keyword>, Chairman &amp; CEO- Eros Digital. She further said, “Both entities have created path-breaking content masterpieces which have truly entertained our esteemed audiences. This agreement between Eros Now and NBCUniversal plays to each partner’s individual strength and the consumer is the ultimate winner. We are confident that this collaboration will be a fruitful one, supporting our strategy to continue to scale our business and create value for all our stakeholders.” <keyword id="8950486" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Belinda-Menendez">Belinda Menendez</keyword>, President &amp; Chief Revenue Officer, Global Distribution and International, NBCUniversal, said, “We are delighted to collaborate with Eros Now as an OTT partner for the South Asia market. This new deal will not only bolster their existing portfolio of premium content, but it also ensures that their viewers will be able to enjoy NBCUniversal’s vast catalogue of comedy and drama series for many years to come.”

Eros Now partners with NBCUniversal to launch Eros Now Prime

<ul><li>While the ad industry has a lot of womentoday, many drop out by the time they reach mid-management levels, primarily due to the lack of flexible hours, or the flexibility to work from home.</li><li>The women leaders we spoke to believe organizations need to prioritize training more women, to prepare them for leadership roles, and this should be a part of the company’s culture.</li><li>There is also a need to relook at the way employee’s performances are evaluated, coming up with newer ways of assessing talent in a time where the way of doing business has seen a complete overhaul.</li></ul> In late 2019, a report by Credit Suisse stated that women’s representation in boardrooms in India increased only by 4.3% between 2014 and 2019. The report further stated that the current female representation on boards is only 15.2% which invariably led to dialogues around the conspicuous lack of women leaders in the upper rungs of the corporate world. Having said that, the world of advertising, marketing and media is one industry that has seen a lot of women in roles of leadership. While we are still far from an equal man-woman ratio in the industry, it is heartening to see more and more women take the top spots. Conversations with most women leaders from the industry led us to believe that this is an industry that welcomes women to be a part of the workforce. However, it is during their mid-career levels that a lot of women drop out of the workforce, leading to a dip in women who take up higher positions. We reached out to some of the most influential women in the industry currently, to gauge what are the reasons for these drop-outs, and what needs to be done, as an industry as well at individual organizational levels, to ensure that women are retained, and even if they drop-out, are encouraged to rejoin the workforce. We received an overwhelming response to our queries from across the sector from women who made some really compelling points. These women who feel passionately about the subject laid their hearts bare, telling us ways they think the industry can evolve, to become more inclusive. Here are some of the most prominent voices. Building a culture of inclusivity It is often noticed that while a lot of women are joining the workforce, many of them take the decision of quitting once they decide to get married or decide to have children. Many find it difficult to come back, due to the lack of flexible working hours at their workplaces, or even due to a certain amount of judgment where people look at them a little differently after they come back from a long break. Most of the women leaders we spoke to believe that the work culture needs to evolve a little, to make way for such women, giving them the flexibility that many of them need, once they start a family. <keyword id="4356726" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="srija-chatterjee">Srija Chatterjee</keyword>, Managing Director, Publicis Worldwide, India shared that while a few corporates have started giving some assistance to women, the ad industry hasn’t yet started doing that actively. “As an industry, we have woken up to women leaders and we are trying to make things happen for women, to make sure that they don't jump off from the workforce. However, there's still a long way to go. The biggest reason women stop working is when they get into that life stage of having children. A lot of corporates are today providing strong support, through office crèches or flexi-timing options. That has not yet happened in our industry. From a business perspective, the size of our agencies might not be that big, which makes implementing this a bit of a challenge. But the more and more we get into a group structure, and offices become more centralized, it will enable organizations to look at shared resources to help women pursue their passion. This is something that could be done, but has not been done yet.” A lot of times, there is also a lot of judgement involved when women come back to work after a long break. Delving deeper into the need for a change in attitude, Pallavi Chakravarti, Executive Creative Director, Taproot Dentsu said, “You’ve been out of the scene way too long - you can’t expect the salary that you do after the kind of leave you’ve taken - but won’t your attention be divided now?” These are just some of the things women hear when they are seeking to make their way back into the workforce, post a long gap. Of course, this is not a blanket statement - times are changing, mindsets are changing, as are corporate policies. But if companies truly want to be gender-neutral then statements and questions like the ones I’ve cited above would never be heard again. Additionally, flexible working hours, working from home, working on time-bound projects are all steps that more and more organisations can adopt to ensure equal opportunities. And when I say equal, I mean that these options should be made available to both men and women. Shedding some light on how OLX is working on retaining some of its women, Sapna Arora, Chief Marketing Officer, OLX India said, “Setting the right example of favourable work culture much suited to women, not just in terms of facilities and infrastructure, but also in terms of broadening our thinking within an organization across various levels, is the key to inspire women working population to join the workforce and perform better. OLX, as an organization, is working on taking baby steps in creating empowering workplace for women. A couple of years ago, we at OLX embarked on a journey to evaluate the gender diversity ratio and actively worked to encourage more women in roles such as data scientists, engineers, front line sales and more. This is a conscious choice we have made under our global diversity and inclusion programme which seeks to improve the gender ratio across STEM and leadership roles.” Talking about the need to prioritize diversity in leadership, Emrana Sheikh, Enterprise HR Head for India and South Asia – Johnson &amp; Johnson said, “Today, companies are increasingly equating their C-suite diversity to competitive advantage for their businesses – and rightly so, it leads to robust dialogue, richer decisions and the empathy to design good, and human-centered solutions. For organizations looking for a paradigm shift in their work cultures, C-suite diversity sets an example for the rest of the team. At the basic level, it can be a source of inspiration that resonates down to the front-line staff. This is only possible when diversity in the leadership is prioritized and its long-term implementation is ensured at all levels through intentionality and focused talent management. Internal platforms such as Diversity &amp; Inclusion Council and Employee Resource Groups further drive culture strategies from a variety of lenses, championing inclusivity as a collective goal across levels. An inclusive culture transcends barriers, bias and bureaucracy, and makes the employees truly feel that they belong. All around, women are a critical mass of consumers, influencers, stakeholders and communities. Hence, reflection of the same in organizations is a business imperative.” Sharing a similar sentiment, Neena Dasgupta, CEO and Director, Zirca Digital Solutions added, “Organizations need to ensure that women in the workplace are respected and recognized.For women to thrive in the workplace, organizations need to ensure an environment that is rooted in equal opportunity and a culture that is geared to assist women achieve their goals.” Sharing some tips on a few things that can be done at the organization level to help women continue to be a part of an organization, Ayesha Ghosh, General Manager, Taproot Dentsu added, “Younger women need to see older women in positions of influence. Flexible working hours and working from home might be a challenge in an industry that’s made a virtue of unreasonable working hours but we ought to be non-negotiable about starting early, cutting idle chatter, short lunch breaks and everything else that helps finish work early so that parents (and everyone else, really!) get to spend some time with their families. Ingraining fundamental values will go a much longer way than making token gestures. Enforcing paternity leave, for instance, so that the onus of child-rearing is not on the mother alone. When a parent, regardless of gender is expected to manage time such that they are responsible for their work as well as for their families, everyone will automatically spend less time on idle chatter and work a lot more efficiently.” An organization's culture also needs to have empathy at its foundation, shared Oindrila Roy, Head of Strategy, India, Essence, to make a difference. "As with any type of workforce integration, empathy should be the edifice on which workplaces are designed to integrate and retain both women and men more seamlessly. For women, it starts with stepping into her shoes, evaluating challenges from her point of view and arriving at solutions which are conducive. For example, an online survey conducted by JobsForHer found that 38% of women do not return to the workforce after giving birth, due to the lack of good day care for children. If that is the challenge, companies need to think of solving this problem innovatively - can the organisation collaborate with a nanny service provider to avail reliable childcare options to its employees? Reassured and empowered parents are likely to stay in the workforce longer." Modifying existing performance benchmarks Rubeena Singh, CEO, iProspect India believes that there is a need to relook at the performance benchmarks on which employees are evaluated. “In the middle years, I often see that we are trying to evaluate people on certain benchmarks. The criteria for these performance indicators have been put in place years ago when it was a largely male-dominated workforce. Things like 8 hours of work, or work in office, or if you want a senior position, you should have worked in different geographies etc. But sometimes, for women, it becomes very difficult to be mobile and move to different parts of the country, especially once they get married. As an industry, we really need to re-evaluate the criteria. We should look for quality now, if people are curious, if they are team-players, how innovative and out-of-the-box can they think. If these changes are brought about, a lot of women will find it easier to catch up from where they left, even if they are coming back after a long break.” Treating both men and women as equals at the workplace A lot of women leaders feel that there is an immediate need to start looking at both men and women as equals in the workspace and not differentiate on the basis of gender. Lara Balsara Wajifdar, Executive Director at Madison World said, “We need to look at women leaders as leaders first and not as women leaders. Don’t differentiate us on the basis of our gender, but differentiate us on the basis of our work! Our industry is always hungry for good talent and if the talent is good, the agency will always accommodate personal requests as long as the work is not affected.” Many also feel the starting point is to start a conversation, where both the genders are treated as equal participants. “<keyword id="6372584" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="gender-equality">Gender equality</keyword> is not just a women’s issue, it’s a human rights issue – that extends to all realms, including the workplace. To encourage equality across all lines of command in the workplace and have more women leaders, we need more men to be equal participants in the conversation around gender equality. Having the male workforce as partners can bring empowerment and equal respect among all genders. Global change-making initiatives like the UN’s ‘He for She’ Movement, of which I am a strong advocate, have been setting strong examples for people of all genders to take bold steps in solidarity and are working towards a gender-equal world,” said <keyword id="235731" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Nadia-Chauhan">Nadia Chauhan</keyword>, JMD &amp; CMO, Parle Agro. Pointing out to some things that need to be done at an organizational level, Rishika Lulla Singh, CEO Eros Digital at Eros International said, “There needs to be a cultural shift and change at workplaces to eradicate gender inequality and retain women employees. It is about time that companies consider deserving women for higher level positions and evaluate their performance sans bias. If there are more women leaders out there at the top positions, it gives a sense of confidence to the global sisterhood with strong role models. It is essential that companies organize mentorship programs to break the stereotype of what a man and a woman can or should do. There are several ways to retain a woman employee at work, but we also need to encourage more women to join the workforce. Equal pay, ensuring all voices are heard and feeling valued, creating safe work environment, etc. are all the least we can do.” Pooja Jauhari, CEO, The Glitch put it rather succinctly in her three-point recommendation on how to retain women. She said, “Firstly, treat your entire talent base with gender blindness. Best person for the job. Without over-thinking their family, marital, ‘emotional’ status. Just get the right person for the job. Secondly, allow your talent to align personal and professional goals and build a support system for them to come back to the same position at work after a break (marriage| child birth) and lastly, stop saying a certain gender matters more, prove by example by showing gender balance across functions.” Training young employees to think of themselves as leaders There is also a need for seniors to build an environment of motivating young women while also making them aware of their potential as future managers, shared Sujata Dwibedy, Group Trading Director, Ampilifi India. She said, “This question is asked to mostly senior women but ideally, both senior men, women and the entire team should be equally responsible to motivate the young, efficient women. The entire organisation gains if they can train and then retain competent women leading up to a management role. It is critical to show them advancement opportunities and their growth path. Policies might have to be tweaked but if it benefits all, it should not matter. Building an inclusive workplace, an organisational environment that values diversity not just for the sake of appearances but for the competitive edge that comes with access to multiple perspectives would make a difference.” There are a lot of internal barriers that women have to cross and training them to believe in themselves could help in ensuring they make it to the top. <keyword id="346168" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Lulu-Raghavan">Lulu Raghavan</keyword>, Managing Director, Landor Associates said, “Even before thinking of getting more women leaders, we have to think of how we can create a better working place holistically. Secondly, you have to ensure that women at the top, doing good work get the visibility. It starts with the leadership, company philosophy and culture. You’ve got to find them and put them on the top because deserving women do exist. You can’t give us an excuse that there aren’t any women relevant for the top positions. A lot of training has to be done with women themselves; there are a few external barriers such as company policies, work environment, how other people behave towards you, and there are internal factors, which we women have set up through the years. It is the lack of self-confidence, self-doubt and imposter syndrome. We women have to be trained to be leaders. It should be different from the overall management chain because it is decades of social conditioning that companies have to break when women join them. “ Anita Kotwani, Senior Vice President, New Business, Mindshare added, “The industry needs to first acknowledge that Woman leaders can deliver as well as their male counterparts for senior-level roles. The grooming required should be done for the role and not the gender. If that happens you will see the necessary shift with more woman leaders leading the mantle.” Sharing her optimism about the future where she envisions more and more women to be on the top, Kranti Gada, COO Shemaroo Entertainment said, “A few years ago, I participated in a program called ‘Tanmatra’ organized by IIM Bangalore, to help develop and groom fellow women counterparts for about 9 months and the stories I heard about the differences in opportunities shocked me a little. I was happy to be at Shemaroo, where we have seen women in key roles leading from the front and managing the core business with ease and expertise. While the ratio of women is a little skewed in the industry, the gender gap is narrowing, and we will see more women taking charge in future in every field.”

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‘Eros International and STX Entertainment together can yield run-rate revenue and cost synergies of up to $50 million by 2022’

Samarpita Banerjee

Eros Now partners with NBCUniversal to launch Eros Now Prime

BI India Partner

Making the industry more gender-inclusive: Women leaders show us the way

Samarpita Banerjee

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