Apple Exec: India's Bollywood Is A "Potentially Large Market"

by , 9:00 AM EDT, August 25th, 2003

There's been a lot of press recently from Indian publications concerning the arrival of the G5 in India. Apple's newest Power Mac platform has been getting a lot of ink in India, and yes, we'll avoid any jokes about Indian Ink. In any event, a an article from Agence France-Presse (AFP) published by SpacePortal ("Your Portal To Space"), says that Apple is making a serious effort to woo Bollywood.

Bollywood, for those who don't know, is the name India's remarkably prolific film industry, and is an obvious reference to Hollywood. Bollywood makes some 800 films each and every year, according to the BBC, and that represents a lot of editing and rendering time (by way of comparison, the same article also says that Hollywood turns out some 100 films in a typical year). Apple, according to the AFP article, wants a piece of the action. From the article.

"India is a huge untapped market for Apple and apart from traditional industries such as designing and animation we are also looking to Bollywood as a potentially large market," said Richard Ng, product marketing manager for Apple's Asia Pacific region.

"We have been in talks with producers and we have been getting a lot of positive feedback."

Apple dealers said the new processor is expected to go down well in the industry, especially with the new generation of filmmakers such as Farhan Akhtar and Raj Kumar Santoshi.

These filmmakers are already using the G4 to edit their films.

"Farhan Akhtar and Raj Kumar Santoshi are already using Macs and FCP 4 to edit their films," says Anil Achary, one of the biggest Apple dealers in the city.

There's more information in the full article at SpacePortal.

The Mac Observer Spin:

India has somewhere around a billion people. Those people, those who can afford to at least, watch a lot of movies. Bollywood is simply a money machine, and it would be an incredible thing for Apple to become a major player in that market.

We leave it to anyone with more knowledge of life in India than we have to comment on whether or not this could lead to other market opportunities for Apple. Even if not, however, there is significant opportunity for Apple to make some money selling Final Cut (Pro and Express), Power Mac G5s, PowerBooks, Shake, DVD Studio Pro, and the other tools of the trade to this one niche market in India.

Full AFP Article