Bharath Ram, Chief Product Officer (CPO) at JioHotstar
India’s digital problem just isn’t serving billions of customers however embracing numerous micro-markets, mentioned Bharath Ram, Chief Product Officer (CPO) at JioHotstar, on the India Digital Summit 2026, highlighting that platforms constructed for India should be designed for range moderately than averages.
Talking at a fireplace chat, Bharath mentioned India can’t be handled as a single market, even at an enormous scale. As an alternative, digital merchandise should account for vast variations in language, gadgets, cultural context, consideration spans and value sensitivity, a actuality he described as constructing for “many Indias”.
Utilizing dwell sports activities as a reference level, Bharath outlined the intense calls for positioned on Indian streaming platforms. Occasions akin to India–Pakistan cricket matches draw hundreds of thousands of concurrent customers inside minutes, lots of whom swap languages, gadgets and cost strategies in actual time.
“Profitable the match stream is desk stakes,” Bharath mentioned. “The actual alternative lies in successful all the pieces across the match from discovery, cross-sell and expertise.”
Personalisation, he famous, features as infrastructure moderately than a characteristic within the Indian context. Platforms should constantly infer consumer intent at scale, adapting commentary languages, dwelling display suggestions throughout dwell viewing.
Design simplicity is equally important, Bharath mentioned, explaining that efficient Indian merchandise cut back cognitive load moderately than add layers of sophistication. Interface selections from navigation labels to visible hierarchy, all the pieces should stay immediately comprehensible throughout age teams and ranges of digital literacy, significantly as viewing shifts between cellular gadgets and large-screen televisions.
pragmatic view
On synthetic intelligence, Bharath emphasised a practical view. Whereas generative AI has captured business consideration, he mentioned its most quick worth lies in operational and experience-driven use circumstances akin to automated subtitling, metadata technology, advert relevance and personalised subscription presents.
On the identical time, JioHotstar is experimenting with AI-generated content material, significantly in Indian epic-led storytelling, the place culturally acquainted narratives amplify the impression of AI-driven visuals.
Bharath additionally highlighted evolving consumption patterns, together with the rise of second-screen behaviour. Viewers more and more have interaction with parallel content material memes, checking associated content material and interactive options alongside main viewing, signalling a shift from passive consumption to layered engagement.
Vertical video codecs and conversational discovery are rising as key frontiers for Over-The-Prime (OTT) platforms, he added. As content material libraries develop and a focus spans shorten, customers will more and more desire to work together with platforms for suggestions based mostly on temper or context moderately than navigate menus.
Bharath concluded, noting India’s complexity as a strategic benefit, including, “Whenever you construct for range, you create improvements that don’t simply work in India, however scale globally.”
(With inputs from BL intern Tejaswini S)
Printed on January 30, 2026
