‘Railways offers a whole gamut of compelling media investment opportunities’

Speaking on the theme of ‘How OOH industry can tap into Railway media opportunities’ at the Karnataka Talks OOH conference that was held in Bengaluru on February 9, Harietha S, Assistant Commercial Manager, Bengaluru Division South Western Railway, said that Indian Railways had undertaken a major policy overhaul in the last two years to accelerate the growth of non-fare revenues. The modifications were made to leverage the true potentials of advertising revenues at the railway stations, on trains and on land adjacent to rail tracks outside big stations. She cited that:

•    Earlier the location outside a station’s premises was offered as a package based on the jurisdiction of packages/zones. Now, locations under the entire South Western Railway is offered as one package covering Bengaluru, Mysuru and Hubballi Divisions covering an area of 4,73,306 sq feet for a minimum license fee of Rs 22.05 crore per annum as a 10-year contract.
•    Previously, Content On Demand was provided on board entertainment directly on passengers’ personal devices but now Digital Entertainment Service Provider (DESP) for Content on Demand (COD) Services have been made on Build Operate Transfer (BOT) model for Indian Railways on Garib Rath (1), Jan Shatabdi (1), Rajdhani (2), Sampark Kranti Express (2) and Shatabdi Express (1) trains.
•    In the previous policy, separate train exterior vinyl wrapping and advertisements on internal panels (Mail/Express/Premium trains to be tendered by Railway Board) were available but now different packages have been designed along with different price range for different trains running.
•    Earlier RDN Policy had one centrally y managed Railway Display Network across 2,000 railway stations across India. But, now the current policy offers region-2 of the package covering 1,042 stations with a Minimum Reserve Price of Rs200crore and out of which 20 stations of Bengaluru division are covered.

Harietha pointed out the likelihood of the media rights coming back to the Bengaluru Division. The division has already identified various prime locations with total advertising area of 1,76,287 sq. ft, other than inside station properties.  

She urged the industry to tap into the upcoming media opportunities in the Bengaluru Division of South Western Railway and said that the division was open to a dialogue with the industry on this count.