The implications of PVR Cinemas signing up with BookMyShow to offer online ticketing of movies, are immense: while PVR Cinemas wasn't quite the last-little-Gaulish-village holding out against the might of BookMyShow - it is probably the largest multiplex chain in India, not having PVR on board did prevent BookMyShow from claiming absolute dominance in the online movie ticketing space in India. The stand-off between PVR (387 screens, including Cinemax) and BookMyShow (1400 screens) is historic - PVR is among the largest movie theater companies in India, and it is the dominant player in the lucrative urban market. Some thoughts on the implications of this deal: - For PVR: PVR is going to continue to retail tickets on its own website and apps, but the the integration with BookMyShow gives it access to a potentially larger set of customers. This means that it retains its loyal users, but also gets those who primarily search for movie tickets on BookMyShow (since it has a larger aggregation of theaters), and also more things to do; BookMyShow also has other offerings like Plays, Music festivals, Cricket matches and the annual F1 Grand Prix. There might be a temptation, if traffic moves away from the PVR website and app entirely, to have them powered by BookMyShow, instead of bearing the cost of maintaining that platform. - For Customers: For customers, this is a great deal. There is now a single site for booking movie tickets, and it means that customers don't have to check two sites (PVR…
