Cinemas En route To Hit Pre-Covid Levels In 2-3 qtrs: Ajay Bijli

Movie theatre attendance and income in the South have returned to pre-covid levels, according to Ajay Bijli, managing director of the combined PVR Inox Ltd. However, given the limited movie supply following the pandemic, those in other regions of India would take another 2-3 quarters.

The movie mogul, who plans on opening 200 new screens per year, will profit from economies of scale on all fronts, including capital and operating expenditures, he continued. Executives from both sides will be a part of a new leadership structure that will take over. In addition, Bijli stated that 50% of the company’s new multiplex sites will be in the South, an area that is still underserved.

Reportedly, Ajay Bijli said in an interview that Sanjeev (Bijli, joint managing director, PVR Ltd) and I are running the company. Meanwhile, Alok Tandon (former Inox CEO) is taking care of the west, entral and east India as co-CEO, and Gautam Dutta (former PVR Group CEO) is looking after north and south India as co-CEO. “Both will have more than 800-900 screens to look after, more than they were doing before the merger,” he added.

The corporation is implementing a 100-day programme called Parikrama in which a team of employees is analysing line items, cost items, and revenue items to identify synergies and the anticipated advantages of the combined organisation.

Boston Consulting Group is assisting with other management areas, while the talent and leadership consulting firm Korn Ferry is assisting with human resources. With roughly 23,000 employees between the two organisations, Bijli said that there is no rationalisation at the unit level because it is already quite lean.

While speaking about the merged entity, Bijli said, “What this merged entity does is that it makes the balance sheet stronger and makes our screen capex better because now, we are able to make bigger orders to all our suppliers, like manufacturers of seats or carpets or projection systems. In terms of quantitative growth, the combined entity had already signed a big pipeline individually. So first, individually, we were growing by about 80 to 90 odd screens a year, now we will be doing 200 screens a year.” He further added that as it continues to consider leases with a usual term of 15 to 20 years, at least 20% of the 1700 screens will constantly need some type of restoration or upgrade.

According to Bijli, the corporation can’t just open multiplexes where there is already sufficient capacity. In terms of amount of supply and consumption on the demand side, South has already perked up significantly, and they have reached their pre-covid level. Other areas, such as the north, west, and east, continue to take their time. Bijli cited The Kashmir Files, Gangubai Kathiawadi, Drishyam 2, and Pathaan as a success, adding that he finds the outcomes quite encouraging.

Bijli believes that it should only take the business two to three more quarters to recover. Though he said that he is being cautious that it might occur sooner. He said that they are going through a relatively brief phase right now.