User additions in India among the best for Prime Video globally: Exec

“Prime Video in India is among the fastest-growing services of Prime Video globally in terms of new customer adoption,” Prime Video India country director Sushant Sreeram told ET.

Without divulging any specific figure, he said Prime Video remains committed to doubling its investments in India over the next five years as the subscriber growth momentum for the platform remains strong.

“We made a commitment recently that we will be doubling our investments in Prime Video in India over the next five years. We remain committed to that,” he added.

Prime Video, which comes bundled with Amazon’s Prime membership programme, continues to invest heavily in content across original shows and movies. In fact, Prime Video in India has the highest proportion of Prime members who stream the service regularly.

“Our appetite for investing in building Prime Video into the default destination remains intact, which should only be possible if we continue to see customers from across the length and breadth of the country joining the platform,” Sreeram said.The Prime Video India chief also said content, distribution, and product are the key growth pillars on which the platform stands.Speaking about the key content trends, Sreeram said there is a massive expansion of the linguistic palette as 60% of Prime Video customers consume content in four or more languages. He added that half of the viewership for Prime Video’s shows and movies comes from outside their home states.

Not only is Indian content breaking local language barriers, it is also travelling outside India, with a quarter of the total viewership of Prime Video’s Indian original shows happening outside the country among the diaspora and non-diaspora audiences.

Sreeram said Prime Video India’s original crime thriller series ‘Farzi’ is a case in point, as it ranked No. 2 on IMDB among the most popular shows launched globally in 2023. IMDB is owned by Amazon.

He also said international content is finding audiences in India, with 75% of Prime Video viewers watching international shows and movies. Furthermore, 25% of the consumption of international content happens in Indian languages.

Sreeram said Prime Video has also expanded the content selection for its members by launching an aggregation service, Prime Video Channels, in 2021 with eight partners, which has since grown to 18 partners.

“Cumulatively, these 18 partners bring 26,000 hours of additional content selection across shows and movies. Prime Video Channels have also served as the launch pad for some of our channel partners like Stingray, AMC+ and Acorn TV,” he added.

He said Prime Video’s movie rental service, which boasts a library of over 4,000 movies, has seen customers from 95% of the pin codes rent a movie. “Almost 90% of our movie rental library is rented at least once every month,” Sreeram said.