MUMBAI: Eros Now, the digital arm of Eros International Plc announced a collaboration with Microsoft to build a next generation online video platform on Microsoft Azure targeted at better consumer experience. The partnership will also help the latter to expand in the Indian market as it is one of Microsoft’s first forays into India’s crowded digital video space.
“India is one of the fastest-growing digital entertainment and media markets worldwide, driven by the growth in online video content. AI and intelligent cloud tools will be the next drivers of the media business and will impact everything from content creation to consumer experience. We are very excited to work with Eros Now to redefine the online video watching experience for consumers,” Microsoft India president Anant Maheshwari said.
Using Microsoft Azure and Azure Media Services, Eros will develop a new, intuitive online video platform. The new platform will provide seamless delivery of content for its consumers across geographies and languages, supported by a robust infrastructure including Azure Content Delivery Network (CDN).
Eros will work to create new interactive voice offerings for consumers, powered by Azure AI tools, including OTT app video search experiences and voice search for video content across 10 Indian languages.
“The online video market has brought a paradigm shift in the way technology is used and will be used to enhance the customer journey and user experience. We at Eros Now have been the earliest movers in the adoption of technology which is a core strength of the brand. The objective and the goal of this collaboration is to ensure we become the primary innovators for the video business and a gold standard for the others to follow. We have immense respect for Microsoft as a company to help us innovate and pave the path for the next generation of online video,” Eros Digital CEO Rishika Lulla Singh said.
To increase consumer satisfaction and loyalty, Eros will create an engine to deliver personalised content recommendations for consumers by leveraging its own user data, combined with Azure AI, analytics, Cloud Data Warehousing solutions and Azure Media Services.
Microsoft, Corp said, “As an innovator in on-demand video, Eros Now has been transforming the way millions of people access and consume content. By using our combined expertise across technology and media, we have an opportunity to build on that foundation and re-imagine entertainment for the rapidly growing audience of digitally-connected consumers in India," Rishika Lulla Singh executive vice president Peggy Johnson said.
