India to have over 4 million 'digital only consumers' by 2020

New Delhi : With affordable smartphones and data packages available in the country, India is likely to double its 'digital only consumers' up to 4 million by 2020, said a report released by Ficci-EY.

Titled as 'Reimagining India's M&E sector', the report mentions that India currently has 1-1.5 million users who do not prefer traditional media over online media. "This customer base (is expected) to grow to around 4 million by 2020 and generate significant digital subscription revenues for the media and entertainment (M&E) sector," the report added.

By 2020, India is likely to become second largest online video viewing audience globally, given by the exponential growth of video consumption over digital media.

Overall, the M&E industry is poised to touch USD 31 billion by 2020.

"With the fall in broadband pricing triggered by Jio, the gap between the cost of watching an hour of TV on broadband and traditional cable or DTH has significantly reduced," it said.

It also mentioned how affordable pricing of having a smartphone will just boost the thought of making digital India.

Fall in the price of broadband has been suspected as the biggest threat to the tradition DTH media.