BENGALURU/CHENNAI (Reuters) – Saregama India Ltd reported a 21% rise in third-quarter profit on Friday, as the record label benefited from licensing more movie songs to its streaming partners and growing sales of its Carvaan music player.
The company’s profit rose to 525.2 million rupees ($6.5 million) in the December quarter, from 434 million rupees, a year earlier.
Revenue from operations rose nearly 23% to 1.85 billion rupees.
Regional film albums released in the quarter included the Tamil film “Gatta Kusthi” and Telugu movie “Gundellona”, while films it co-produced – such as Punjabi flick “Oye Makhana” and Malayalam actor Prithviraj Sukumaran’s “Kaapa” – also hit the screens.
Saregama, owned by soccer-to-electricity conglomerate RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group, said revenue from its music business rose to a record 1.55 billion rupees from 1.33 billion rupees.
The company licenses its catalogue of over 142,000 songs to streaming apps such as Spotify and Amazon Music as well as television channels such as Kalaignar TV.
Companies such as Ola Electric and Hyundai also licensed Saregama’s songs in the latest quarter.
The media and entertainment industry is expected to grow 11% by fiscal 2024 due to increased smartphone usage, ad revenues shifting from traditional to digital platforms and an uptick in demand for subscription services, according to Firstcall Research.
Saregama said sales of its Carvaan portable music player increased roughly 19% to 168,000 Carvaan units, helped by the launch of a new mobile variant.
The company’s shares closed nearly 3% higher at 359.35 rupees on Friday. They fell nearly 27% in 2022. ($1 = 81.1300 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by Kashish Tandon in Bengaluru and Praveen Paramasivam in Chennai; Editing by Janane Venkatraman and Savio D’Souza)