Viacom18's Youth, Music and English Entertainment cluster further strengthens its 2022 multiplatform content strategy; announces upcoming plans

Catering to India’s dynamic young audience, Viacom18’s Youth, Music and English Entertainment (YME) cluster comprising MTV, MTV Beats, Comedy Central, Colors Infinity and Vh1 has been on a steady growth path. Entertaining its audience with engaging programming and exciting innovations throughout the year, Viacom18’s Youth Music and English Entertainment cluster, unveils its content plans for FY22-23. Continuing its winning streak, the unique repertoire of brands witnessed a remarkable growth with 9.8 billion impressions on content across TV, social media and the networks streaming/OTT platform Voot, in the past year. The business unit was also able to draw viewers during non-prime time through exciting sports content. By fulfilling its audiences’ appetite with adventure, love, fiction, non-fiction, sports and snackable escapes, Viacom18’s Youth, Music and English Entertainment division has successfully cemented its position as a leading youth brand in the country. 2022 is set to be the year of Viacom18’s YME cluster, with transformation and elevation at the heart of its clutter-breaking content inventory and innovations. Promising a year of change and kinetic offerings, it is ready to revolutionize the game by becoming the only brand in its category that brings to the youth uniquely entertaining ‘escape clusters’. With fiction, non-fiction, sports, short-format and snackable content, and a foray in the Metaverse, the brand has its finger on the pulse. The YME division will reinvent, reimagine and risk as it pivots across platforms in a way that is daring and contemporary, just like the audience it caters to. Confidently striding into the digital landscape and expanding its digital footprint, YME unit recently launched the Fully Faltoo NFT platform (https://www.fullyfaltoonft.com/) that saw more than 3000 digital collectibles sold out within a couple of hours. The hugely successful marketplace is now set to offer another range of diverse digital collectibles from its iconic brands like MTV, Vh1 and Comedy Central. The brand will also launch its maiden short-form video offering Fully Faltoo, with over a dozen new web shows and fully entertaining snackable content.  ‘KaanPhod’, a brand-new business division will provide emerging musical artistes an opportunity to showcase their talent. Season one of ‘Mic Test’ on KaanPhod, will introduce 10 promising new artists and their original tracks, which will also be made available for viewers on television (MTV, MTV Beats, and Vh1), social and streaming platforms. The multiplatform cluster promises to surpass its own benchmarks of genre-defining entertainment and legacy shows. India’s biggest and longest-running adventure reality show, MTV Roadies, will embark upon its first-ever international journey in South Africa with a new host, show elements and palpable surprises. Moreover, MTV Hustle 2.0 will continue the quest for India’s next big rap sensation, in the second high-decibel season of the country’s first-ever rap reality show. With the unique proposition of ‘The Inventor’s Challenge’, Colors Infinity amps-up its content library and brings to light the journey of an idea from paper to a working prototype of the product created by amateur inventors. Speaking on the clusters’ robust plans for the upcoming year, Anshul Ailawadi, Head – Youth, Music and English Entertainment, Viacom18 said, “The last 2 years have been unprecedented for young South Asians. They’ve emerged stronger after grappling with a once-in-a-generation black swan event. This is the right time for the Youth, Music and English entertainment (YME) cluster to pivot. In the coming fiscal we will scale up and revamp each and every legacy property from Roadies to Hustle to Splitsvilla and launch newer formats. We will double down on our growing digital presence and launch a multiplatform short video offering ‘Fully Faltoo’ along with ‘KaanPhod’ - a platform to discover and mount emerging musical talent and original songs. The success of our maiden NFT offering will be followed up with more Web 3.0-focused initiatives. We’ve also worked a new slate of international English content for Colors Infinity and Comedy Central. The team is geared up for an action-packed year like never before.” The cluster stays committed to creating unique concepts that engage with the youth, keeping in mind the ubiquitous presence of its audience. Recognized for its singular connect with its young audience through unique styles of storytelling, engagement, and research, the cluster aims at scaling up its high-value content while simultaneously foraying into new offerings, to change the face of the youth entertainment space.