Guvera celebrates first year in India, plans expansion

Australian music streaming service, Guvera, this week celebrated its first anniversary in India – with plans to expand its presence in the country.

Guvera was the first international streaming service to enter the market. In the first 12 months, it started with 1.5 million sign-ups and built up to its current six million. It expects to hit at least 10 million in the next few months.

The appeal is free access to 20 million Indian-language and western tracks, including the phenomenally successful Bollywood music, and locally curated playlists. The selection will be significantly widened through 2016, its executives say.

Guvera also teamed up with a number of brands to increase its profile.  This has primarily been through its Brand Channels, a global first for streaming services. Brands as YESBANK, Harley Rock Riders, Ezeego1 and Shaadi.com offer playlists, videos, news, competitions and shopping with seamless integration while users listen to music.

Guvera Head of Business Development Asia, Ananya Amin, said the channel helped the service consolidate in the Indian market. “Brand Channels have given us the opportunity to work with brands and deliver our users exclusive content whilst the social feed has aided in music discovery and engagement between our users,” he explained.

The other success story was the ‘University Stream-Off’ contest in September. It offered university students the chance to win five Guvera sponsorship for their colleges’ festival based on whose Guvera playlists were most streamed. It also introduced streaming to cashed-up students.

On October 30 and 31, it co-sponsored the sixth edition of the Harley Rock Riders in Mumbai, which drew a record 10,000 people to see Harley-Davidson motorcycles as well as bands as Megadeth, The Wailers, Bhayanak Maut, Scribe, Skrat, Indus Creed, F16s, Super Fuzz and The Ska Vengers.

The next major project in India is House of Guvera, set to launch in Mumbai early next year.

It will operate as a recording studio, music venue and production house, targeting Indian and international acts. It gives brands the chance to produce exclusive content to be used through Guvera as well as their own on-line platforms.

According to Amin, “Mumbai is a strategic location to launch its content hub. Music has always been at the heart of the city, so we think it will be a good fit.”

As reported earlier in TMN, the House of Guvera will also open in Australia, in Melbourne, next year.