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Govt calls for removal of all bottlenecks to aide growth of AVGC sector, at CII SummitFX
Aug 25, 2021

MOCI proposes incentivization of co-productions in AVGC @ CII SummitFX

“If there are any policy or regulatory impediments which are hurting the AVGC industry then the government would like to understand them and take necessary steps to remove them.” This was announced by Mr Vikram Sahay, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting at a Special Policy Session on AVGC Sector - Focus on Games & Emerging Verticals on the second day of CII SummitFX 2021 on Wednesday. CII SummitFX is a virtual animation, visual effects and gaming summit which was inaugurated on 24th August and is going to continue till 29th August. The six-day summit has been organised by CII in partnership with the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting; State Government of Karnataka and Software Technology Parks of India.

From the Department of Commerce, the special policy session saw Mr Darpan Jain, Joint Secretary, speaking on the need for support to industry so that it could grow to its full potential. He highlighted five areas for focus in order to grow: Market access, promotion, facilitation and overcoming challenges, export infrastructure and incentivization of co-productions. He added that “there is a consensus that both domestically and globally, there is a significant potential to increase the share of the sector. AVGC is only at 1%, and it is forecasted to grow 20 times in the next 10 years and similar figures are seen from the employment side.”

The purpose of the summit is to highlight the growing power, share and influence of the AVGC sector within the overall media and entertainment space. The AVGC services sector has revenue potential of Rs 1.12 billion (US$ 15 million), and exports account for over 70% of this sector. The sector for animation VFX and games can double the growth rate and make it an INR 1 trillion (US$ 13.45 billion) sector by 2025 creating over 2.5 million additional jobs. With the Ministry of Commerce having made AVGC one of the champion sectors for exports, its voice holds important place in policy conversation.

With technology and virtual reality intruding onto physical and a confluence of virtual and real leading to different kinds of policy and regulatory issues and perplexities, CII’s media and entertainment vertical is working with the government on crafting a National AVGC Policy which is visionary, which smoothens out inter-ministerial regulatory issues and which looks at the bigger picture for 10X growth of industry.

Emphasising on the power of domestic consumption, Mr Sahay stated that while there was great potential to the sub-sectors, there was a need to first mature domestically and make the industry competitive. Responding to that, Mr Rajan Navani, Chairman, CII's India@75 Council and Vice Chairman & Managing Director, JetLine Group of Companies said, “A policy that incentivizes IP creation and drives investments in the sector will help drive value creation from an economic angle”. Having a clear-cut AVGC policy will help address the challenge of creating employment, he said and added that there was an opportunity to shape the industry for the next 20 years.

Echoing similar sentiment, Mr Biren Ghose, Vice-Chairman, CII National Committee on Media & Entertainment and Country Head Technicolor India said that the AVGC sector required policies and enablement of its own as it had become large.  He added  that “the primary goal of the policy initiative is to bring clarity, and as we have newer sectors, they are not fully understood by various stakeholders in the ecosystem.”

Mr Manish Agarwal, CEO, Nazara Technologies, speaking on the importance of gaming said that there were several facets of services within gaming that could help India become a powerhouse, that could truly create large-scale employment. Just as consumer product companies generate immense revenue because of consumer transactions, similarly gaming can help drive economic growth. In order to improve skilling and training, we need to focus on making India a space for global companies to come set up and help develop the entire ecosystem for skills, he said.

Mr Naman Jhawar, Senior Vice President, Strategy and Business Operations Mobile Premier League (MPL) speaking on the potential of games and gaming in India said there was immense potential to make Indian games global. The key was to empower gaming, animation and other related sectors through right policies to distribute their services globally. He felt India was rightfully poised to make that happen.

25 August 2021

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