Known for popular shows like Panchayat and Kota Factory, The Viral Fever (TVF) is launching a motion picture division in an effort to transform into a full-fledged movie production company. Registered as TVF Motion Pictures in April, the company will be headed by Arunabh Kumar, according to data on Tofler. The motion picture division is working on five or six projects, which may involve three different formats. These comprise big-budget productions starring A-list actors, mid-budget productions, and films intended for streaming services.
TVF was established in 2012 and is operated by Contagious Online Media Networks. Arunabh Kumar, an IIT-Kharagpur alumnus with background in film and advertising, along with a couple of other IITians, initiated the journey by uploading videos on YouTube. The first was a parody ragging video called Inglorious Seniors, which drew inspiration from Inglourious Basterds by Quentin Tarantino. That year, Rowdies, a parody of the reality television series Roadies, went viral, marking the YouTube channel’s big break.
That year, Rowdies, a parody of the reality television series Roadies, went viral, marking the YouTube channel’s big break. India’s digital economy was beginning to take shape at this time. Bengaluru has witnessed the emergence of multiple IT firms. These include cab aggregator Ola, beauty retailer Nykaa, and e-commerce behemoth Flipkart, all of which have established themselves in the rapidly developing digital market. These businesses assisted TVF in expanding because numerous tech startups sponsored YouTube content creators’ videos.. TVF launched its first web series, Permanent Roommates (2014), with support from CommonFloor (acquired by Quickr) and Ola Cabs, following the creation of several spoof and parody videos. Pitchers (2015), a television series inspired by India’s startup culture, came next. The content provider continued to upload a minimum of one show to YouTube annually. The group grew to include Sameer Saxena, who left his comfortable consulting position to direct Permanent Roommates, and former lawyer Nidhi Bisht, who was brought in as casting director and appeared in numerous films and television series.
In 2015, TVF launched a free streaming platform, TVF Play.
An unnamed TVF staff member claims, “We ran shows on YouTube, but we felt the platform’s feed did not showcase our content well.” When people thought of Permanent Roommates, they were unable to recall the name of our production company. The brand was becoming less identifiable.
Digital entertainment ecosystem
India’s digital entertainment ecosystem was already taking shape. Streaming giants like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video were laying the groundwork before launching their services in 2016.
The potential for streaming services in India seemed enormous, and TVF appeared to be in the right place at the right time.
The company soon attracted institutional investment, raising $10 million in its first-ever round led by Tiger Global Management in 2016.
The same year, TVF established an office in Delhi to source more local content from northern India. The division, led by Apoorva Singh Karki as creative director, produced a number of shows set in Delhi. These include the middle-class comedy drama Aam Aadmi Family (2016), the teen romance Flames (2018), and the coming-of-age drama Aspirants (2021). According to YouTube, Aspirants currently has approximately 50 million views.
Keen to expand, the company set its sights on releasing content on streaming services.An under-development show about a family’s journey through the 1990s was pitched to Netflix and Prime Video, with State Bank of India (SBI) as a sponsor.
However, TVF’s plan was foiled in March 2017 when an anonymous Medium post accused Founder Arunabh Kumar of sexual harassment in the workplace. The company initially denied the allegations, resulting in extensive negative publicity.
A week after the anonymous post, an FIR was filed against Arunabh, and several women accused him of workplace misconduct. The CEO of the web channel resigned, writing an open letter on Twitter and stating that the company would “always be larger than just one individual.”
Dhawal Gusain, who is currently the CEO of Disney+ Hotstar, succeeded Arunabh and joined the company’s board in 2015. However, the allegations had caused ripples. The company’s reputation suffered, and SBI terminated its sponsorship agreement. A query sent to SBI elicited no response until the publication of this story. Problems continued to worsen. Bisht Please!, which premiered in the same month as the allegations, received low ratings and viewership. According to a former employee, after SBI pulled out, TVF was in talks with Amazon Prime Video about Yeh Meri Family. The platform had even worked on subtitling, among other things, before cancelling the show.
“We’d finished making the show. Everything was finished. So we finally decided to release it exclusively on YouTube,” says the former employee, who requested anonymity. Yeh Meri Family debuted on YouTube and TVFPlay in July 2018, with the Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) as the title sponsor. “Sometimes, multiple brands want to collaborate with TVF on a specific show. However, in order to maintain the sanctity of the content, we prefer having only one partner on each show.
In the case of Yeh Meri Family, collaborating with the Association of Mutual Funds (AMFI) made more business and creative sense, so we chose AMFI as a brand partner for the show,” TVF stated in an emailed response. Netflix picked up the show after a few episodes aired, making it the first TVF production to be available on a streaming platform.
Since then, TVF has attracted sponsorship from top players, including edtech platform Unacademy for Kota Factory and Aspirants, both of which have won critical acclaim. Gullak, Cheesecake, Cubicles, and Hostel Daze have also found their own audiences, with Gullak’s third season being very well received.
Panchayat, which was released during the pandemic, is currently on an exclusive licensing deal with Amazon Prime Video. TVF, which now employs 175 people, currently has over 20 shows and multiple YouTube-sponsored videos in development. The videos provide analytics and help the platform come up with concepts for new shows. Arunabh may have left the CEO’s position but he never left the creative chair. Most of the shows mentioned earlier have him serving either as a producer, creator, or both. However, there has been a massive restructuring in the company since 2020. Core member Sameer Saxena, who directed Permanent Roommates and was executive producer on the first season of Kota Factory, Gullak, and Panchayat, left the TVF umbrella in June 2020 to start his own production house Posham Pa Pictures Pvt. Ltd. Other core TVF members, including Biswapati Sarkar, show creator and the host of Barely Speaking with Arnub; Amit Golani, writer on many TVF videos and shows including Cubicles; and Saurabh Khanna, who wrote Yeh Meri Family and Kota Factory, joined Sameer.
TVF Motion Pictures
TVF intends to enter the world of Hindi films in the post-pandemic era, when mega stars, marketing dollars, studios, and even “decent” stories have failed to entice audiences back to movie theaters. The company is aware of current market trends and public sentiment. Movies starring A-list actors will.
Read also : Let’s Learn More about Vertebrate Animals