MUMBAI: Music delivery and consumption has undergone a massive shift from the physical to digital, with mobile and internet as the most viable option today. Growing at a rapid pace, 65 percent of the Indian music business is digital now with 200 million consumers in the market having 10 to 12 billion unique paid micro transactions in a year.

The session on the ‘Global Music Industry Overview’ at Radioandmusic.com’s Nokia Music Connects 4 had a panel discussion moderated by Mobilium Global CEO Ralph Simon on the ‘New Music Ecosystem’. The other members of the panel were Hungama Digital Media Entertainment MD and CEO Neeraj Roy, Youtube APAC head of music Anthony Zameczkowski, Nokia Entertainment operations director James Bradbury, EMI Music India MD and CEO T Suresh and Fountainhead Promotions and Events chairman Brian Tellis.

Kick starting the panel discussion, Simon pointed out the importance of social media and television in the music market today and expressed that there was a need to utilize these opportunities to monetize success.

The panelists laid emphasis on the fact that major content consumption in the Indian market was through mobile and internet, with the Indian consumer’s main focus being on ‘now’. Citing a KPMG report, Bradbury said, “90 per cent of the internet access is through mobile. In 2016, there will be around 400 million internet connections in India and internet access will grow to a whole new level. It will also be interesting to see the response on Nokia’s introduction of the Lumia handsets which are likely to be released within the next year."

Though the mobile revolution and key developments in the space had brought in a lot of healthy revenues, there was a need for the stakeholders, record labels and artistes to look at the bigger picture. The industry was now at the cusp of the internet revolution with 135 million consumers. The current need was to realign business models in tune with the medium. “The Indian market has had a good run in mobile and digital, but the entire ecosystem comprising of active paying consumers has shrunk to about 60-65 per cent. By 2016, there will be 600mn consumers with 450million unique mobile devices. We need to bring in legitimate consumption,” stated Roy.

Moreover, with regulations on subscription passed earlier this year, there was a 60 percent shrinkage in actual paying consumers in nine months. With the Telcos in India having lost their appeal against the regulation, the industry was sitting in a draconian environment.

With 40-45 percent of Youtube consumption through mobile, the need to curb piracy has increased by tenfold, opined Roy.

Zameczkowski said, “There are 72 hours of video uploaded every minute and by 2015 there will be one and a half million hours of video being transferred between users in a minute. India is an important part of the global platform with 800 million digital and mobile users.”

The panelists expressed surprise at the fact that though the most viral video in recent times, Psy’s ‘Gangnam Style’ garnered a total of 621 million views, only 5 percent of those views were from Korea. Live streaming also was of significance –the Red Bull Stratos project which received 52 million views with 8 million concurrent streaming was an example of the significance of live streaming. While social media held the key to success, in India consumption was important on multiple platforms and thus the service was available across various devices.

Pointing out that the next three to four years were important for the music scene, Sanyal said, “The power of using a platform like Youtube is immense and an artiste can propel to great heights through it. We signed an artiste Shraddha Sharma who was a Youtube star with 15-20 million views with no Bollywood experience. Normal artistes can be as famous as established ones."

Apart from the digital platform and mobile devices being the key focus to success and revenue generation, consumer engagement was another important factor to focus upon. Tellis highlighted the fact that there were over 50 venues in India helping the music scene. But with production values increasing rapidly, revenues now needed to support the value, with the consumer playing a major role. Hoping to encash on the opportunity, Fountainhead revealed plans to expand the ‘Live from Console’ event from a gig in Goa to 3-4 cities every month.

Summing up his take on the panel discussion, Suresh said, “With every new service come new revelations. What did not work on physical is now selling widely on digital. Earlier artistes had a problem in finding audiences, now the new ecosystem takes care of that. Now music production will bigger than what it was earlier.”