Apple gears up for music and TV streaming war in India after Airtel deal
Apple’s partnership with India’s second-largest telecom company would give the iPhone maker a much-needed boost in the content market where it has lagged far behind the likes of Spotify and Walt Disney.
The US tech giant, which is looking to boost global revenue from services including apps, payments and media, will offer free music and video streaming to many of Bharti Airtel’s 281 million customers.
The deal is likely to significantly expand Apple TV and Apple Music users in a country where Apple has long emphasized manufacturing to diversify its supply chain beyond China.
Apple makes many iPhones in India, but they account for just 6% of the country’s 690 million smartphones, compared with about 2% in 2019, according to data from Counterpoint Research.
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“This move shows Apple’s ambition for India,” said Nitesh Kripalani, former head of Amazon Prime Video in India. “This strategy is a time-tested way to build a presence in markets that the company considers important.”
In the US, Apple has offered Apple Music for free through some Verizon mobile data plans since 2019, and Apple TV will be included in Comcast’s streaming bundle starting in May.
In India, Apple Music will be available to premium users of Airtel’s Wynk music app, which will be shut down later.
Airtel’s postpaid contracts give about 7 million subscribers access to the ad-free version of Wynk, but only a fraction use it, an unnamed telecom industry source said.
Neither Apple nor Airtel responded to requests for comment outside regular business hours.
MUSIC BATTLE
Counterpoint co-founder Neil Shah said Apple Music is better suited to the Indian market than Apple TV, which is primarily in English with content including Bollywood and local language songs, although Apple Music’s library is smaller than Spotify’s.
A source in the Indian music industry said Spotify has about 3 million paying users in India, Gaana has 1.4 million, Wynk has 500,000 and Apple Music has 200,000 users, but declined to be named as they were not authorized to share estimates publicly.
Neither Spotify nor Gaana responded to requests for comment outside regular business hours.
Overall, only about 7.5 million people paid for audio streaming services in India last year out of about 185 million users of ad-supported and ad-free apps, according to data from industry group FICCI and consultancy EY.
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Telecom industry sources said Airtel will pay Apple a per-user fee that is significantly lower than the $1.20 monthly fee each for Apple TV and Apple Music services in India.
In return, the company will save millions of rupees in licensing fees as it seeks to shut down Wynk and use Apple Music to boost revenue and improve customer loyalty, a second telecom source said.
“Airtel has realised that its strength is distribution rather than content creation,” said the source, who declined to be identified because they were not authorised to discuss the matter.
VIDEO STREAMING
Apple is a small player in the video streaming space in India, with less than 1 million users, according to Counterpoint estimates. Disney Hotstar is the market leader with 38 million users, while Netflix is estimated to have around 10 million users.
Hinting at the market’s potential, Netflix has repeatedly said it is aiming for 100 million users without giving a specific time frame.
Apple TV is known for original series like “The Morning Show” and “Slow Horses,” but rivals like Netflix and Disney have more Hindi content starring Bollywood actors and even regional language films.
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Disney and Reliance Industries’ JioCinema also stream cricket – India’s most popular sport – and the two companies are merging their media assets in India to create the country’s largest entertainment company.
Airtel, the telecom service provider that trails only Reliance Jio in terms of subscriber base, is planning to offer service plans with free access to Apple TV for months, a second telecom source said.
While that would bring Apple TV into more households, growth could be hampered because “its service offering is still not very optimized locally,” Counterpoint’s Shah said.
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