Warner Music India has struck an exclusive distribution agreement with Punjabi music content consortium and aggregator Sky Digital India. Distribution of Sky Digital’s repertoire outside India will be handled by ADA, Warner’s independent artist and label services division, while Warner Music India will handle distribution within the country.
“The Punjabi music scene is absolutely exploding at the moment and Sky Digital’s artists already have a huge fanbase in India.” Jay Mehta, Managing Director of Warner Music India told MusicBusinessWorldwide.
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Sky Digital India is home to Punjabi music stars including Jaani, B Praak, Mankirt Aulakh, Gippy Grewal, Sunanda Sharma, Sidhu Moosewala and Happy Raikoti and others. Sky Digital also manages premium Punjabi content-based YouTube channels with more than 15 million subscribers, making it the third largest Punjabi YouTube channel collective, with top videos on the site racking up more than 500 million views. The company currently aggregates releases from more than 42 Punjabi labels, two leading mainstream independent Hindi labels, and some top regional labels specialising in Haryanvi and Bhojpuri music – two of the fastest-growing regional languages in India after Punjabi.
Gurkaran Dhaliwal of Sky Digital India told MusicBusinessWorldwide, “We’re excited about the possibilities for our entire region of North India to engage in the worldwide music industry” The deal will see Warner Music India help to grow Sky Digital’s market share in India, currently estimated at around 1% nationally, by establishing a presence for its artists and distributed label content on additional digital music services.