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Preethi J.

Bets on newer areas such as Net, mobiles

Bangalore , Sept. 7

In a classic example of leveraging multiple media to get a brand across, Virgin Comics and Animation (VCA) is working out a strategy to build up an audience across platforms.

The comics book firm recently launched Indianised comics based on Ramayana. Primarily betting on newer media — online and mobile — Virgin will also produce animated features for TV and film.

On the mobile front, the firm has tied up with gaming studio Paradox to develop games on comic characters Devi, Sadhu and Ramayan later this year. The games are being developed and will be launched for the al mobile market. Mobile comics, which could be downloaded panel-by-panel, are also in the pipeline. "We will be simplifying the format, and co-opting them for use in mobile so one could zoom in, and the text would pop-p on the screen," said Mr Sharad Devarajan, CEO, Virgin.

The company also plans to offer screensavers, wallpapers and one-minute flash animations called mobisodes. Mobisodes will be available for downloads in 2007. It is looking at 3-4 companies here, which work in the mobile content domain. The firm also plans to enter into video streaming for mobiles in the future.

Virgin will be offering the mobisodes as a start of a series of events. The mobisodes offered for download for free, would be pieced together with the rest of the 40 minutes, the finale, that consumers could only catch in the movie theatres. "This would be a different distribution model, and a long-term strategy. We have not done this before," said Mr Devarajan.

Online gaming

Online gaming is another aspect of the company's distribution model. It plans to pair an Indian gaming firm with an overseas one to develop an Internet-based game, called massively multiplayer online role playing game "The multiplayer game would be based on Indian mythic epics such as Ramayana, would create a universe for Virgin's readers to connect and will then be used to reach across the characters (as brand images), comics, mobile content and animated features," said Mr Devarajan.

The game will be launched worldwide in 2007, and not earlier as the critical mass of Internet users in India is still not online.

Virgin has an office in Bangalore. It may move to Mumbai in the beginning of next year, said Mr Devarajan. The company was formed by the trio of Sir Richard Branson's Virgin group, Gotham Comics and Deepak Chopra's Intent Media group.

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