Earlier this year, Disney announced it would form a joint venture to combine the businesses of Reliance’s Viacom18 and Disney’s Star India.

This new joint venture will bring together two of the biggest TV and digital streaming platforms in India, bringing together iconic media assets across entertainment (e.g. Colors, StarPlus, StarGOLD) and sports (e.g. Star Sports and Sports18) including access to highly anticipated events across television and digital platforms through JioCinema and Hotstar.

As part of the deal, the new joint venture will be granted exclusive rights to distribute Disney films and productions in India, with a license to more than 30,000 Disney content assets, providing a full suite of entertainment options for the Indian consumer.

According to Economic Times, the new joint venture will see JioCinema merge into Disney+ Hotstar, because Reliance has decided that the Disney+ Hotstar platform has a superior technology infrastructure over JioCinema.

Though there are also other reports that the two platforms could still remain seperate, with one focused on sports, while the other will focus on entertainment.  Currently no official announcement has been made regarding the future of Disney+ Hotstar.

With the combined streaming service and linear channels, the new joint venture will have over 750 million viewers across India and it will also cater to the Indian people around the world.  

Currently, JioCinema has 225 million users and Disney+ Hotstar has 333 million users per month.  Back in June, it was reported that JioCinema has 16 million subscribers and Disney+ Hotstar has 35.5 million subscribers.    With Disney+ Hotstar being the larger of the two services, it makes sense in many ways to use that as the core platform.

The merger has recently been given the approval by the National Company Law Tribunal, CCI and the Central government.  So it likely won’t be too long until the deal is finalised.   Once complete, Disney will own 37% stake in the new company, with Reliance holding 56%

Roger’s Take: Bringing together two of the biggest streaming services in India makes sense, since there are lots of cost saving opportunies, plus will allow it to compete with its competitors like Netflix. It will also be interesting to see if Disney+ Hotstar is rebranded following the completition of the merger and how this might impact Hotstar content internationally, since currently its not available within Disney+ globally.

Do you think Disney+ Hotstar and JioCinema will merge?  Let me know on social media!

Roger Palmer

Roger has been a Disney fan since he was a kid and this interest has grown over the years. He has visited Disney Parks around the globe and has a vast collection of Disney movies and collectibles. He is the owner of What's On Disney Plus & DisKingdom. Email: Roger@WhatsOnDisneyPlus.com Twitter: Twitter.com/RogPalmerUK Facebook: Facebook.com/rogpalmeruk

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