OTT market to be a game-changer for entertainment industry: Fawad Ch

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Science and Technology Chaudhry Fawad Hussain Monday said that the government is all set to launch the country’s first ever-the-top (OTT) TV Pakistan version of Netflix soon for its consumers which would be a “game-changer” for our collapsed entertainment industry.

Talking to a private news channel, Fawad Ch said as soon as PEMRA will complete guidelines, we will bring together technology companies and content companies to one platform and will ask them to join hands with us for the start of the OTT service.

“Use of digital technologies and machines can take the country to new heights and fulfill the dream of our Prime Minister Imran Khan, he said, adding, we must value data to use it for our future progress", he stressed.

With more OTT platforms, Pakistani customers can easily enjoy by watching their most loved TV show or any latest movie series on their smart phones by simply having a connection of Internet, he added.

He said services will be provided with public-private partnership and now its all depends on private companies to expand and flourished their services.

The future is all about convergence of digital technologies and its transformation and that Covid-19 virus has provided the country opportunity to be part of the change rather than resisting it,” he added.

The OTTs will find newer ways to make advertising profitable as movie watching becomes more common and cheaper for everyone with a subscription, he added.

Minister also said one of the major entertainment hangouts which has been affected heavily due to the lockdown forced by the COVID-19 pandemic is the cinema theater so with the transformation of technology through OTTs we will able to revive it.

He explained that Pakistani films were already on declined since years and for its revival we are going to introduced a state of art technology services for our Pakistani consumers where we need to expand its services not only in Pakistan but for foreign investors as well.

However, the charm and experience of big screens will always remain, and they will return back as soon as an accepted cure is out and things trickle back to normalcy, he added.

He said the technical aspect of the first-of-a-kind OTT platform has been completed, and that PEMRA has now been asked to prepare guidelines for the content that will be screened on the medium.

Streaming platforms give power back to content creators. Their mandate of diversification allows for new voices to come to the forefront.

It’s a huge stepping stone in the right direction and I expect a lot of visionary, experimental film-makers from Pakistan will turn to the web in the coming years, he added.