London
The new India, magnet for publishers
By Heidi Dawley
Nov 16, 2007 - 1:06:46 AM

And so it is that today the UK’s second-largest daily newspaper is launching Mail Today, a new English-language daily that will arrive on newsstands in Delhi with an initial target circulation of 120,000.

There are 9 million in the Delhi area who speak English, and the Mail is hardly the first foreign publication to target them. It follows a string of other British and American titles, and as much as anything it reflects the flourishing economy of the former British colony.

“The potential market in India is so big,” says Bhaskara Rao, chairman of the Centre for Media Studies in Delhi. “That’s why everyone wants to get into the Indian market. The future is here and it is growing fast.”

The Daily Mail has teamed up with the Indian publishing house India Today to launch the new daily, with a 26 percent stake, and the aim in time is to roll Mail Today out to the rest of the country, targeting the women of India’s rapidly expanding middle class.

The Daily Mail is well known for its appeal to female demographics in Britain and will be providing expertise on layout design and how to present stories to reach India's women.

Later this year, another major British newspaper, the Sun, a downmarket tabloid, is similarly teaming up with an Indian partner to launch another daily. Magazines with established Indian editions include OK!, Maxim and Vogue, which launched two months ago.

Those come atop a slew of English-language launches from Indian publishing houses without British or American involvement.

The lure of India to foreign publishing houses is the country’s rapid economic growth. GDP is expected to grow 8.6 percent this year, following 9 percent-plus growth last year.

This growth has meant a booming advertising economy, with media spending forecast to grow by 21.6 percent next year. That's compared to 5.1 percent for Britain and 3.1 percent for the U.S., according to GroupM, the huge media buying concern.

“India is one of the fastest-growing media economies in the world. The overall economy is growing well," says Jonathan Barnard, head of publications at ZenithOptimedia. "The media economy grew 28 percent last year.”

Also growing is the consumption of media, reflecting the rise of a new middle class, and it's bound to grow a lot more, which means a steady increase in demand for new media outlets.

As it is now, print's reach is not even 50 percent of India's literate population, or about 222 million in 2006, and growth has been slow. That figure was up just 3 percent from the prior year. Yet there are about 359 million people who can read in the country and yet don’t read any publications.

It's a particularly attractive market for British and U.S. publishers because English is the language of business and of the educated classes. Further, the Indian government has made it easier for foreign investors, though it still restricts their ownership share to 26 percent for publications focusing on news and current affairs.