ACK Media, the owner of Indian comic content such as Amar Chitra Katha, Tinkle and Karadi Tales, has a slew of projects lined up for the year: online games (one called Suppandi World), two animation movies, a Facebook application for Amar Chitra Katha Story Of the Week, and mobile games for the Android. ACK Media CEO and co-founder Samir Patil, in the first half of a two-part interview with MediaNama, talks about the various segments, challenges and why he feels the promise of new media has not worked. What are the challenges you face - what's worked for you? There are two-three big challenges. We are dealing with a very heterogenous consumer base. Everyone has their pet theories on what will work, but its just stories. We have to recognise that we are dealing with 4 or 5 markets, very different, some price sensitive some not. So how does one meet the needs of such a market? It's almost like you are dealing with Europe. There are different dimensions to the customer: one is price. We have to have products at different price points. There is both an opportunity to create a really expensive product that goes to a family in Colaba or a less expensive one for a railway station, just as the FMCG did the sachet model with shampoo: that's a lesson for media companies. Second, distribution is super critical. You know, if content is king, distribution is God. That is a key learning: if you cannot have control of…
