Magzter looks to boost revenue from advertisements

By Madhav Chanchani

MUMBAI: Magzter, the digital magazine store for mobile devices, aims to earn most of its revenue in the next two years from advertisements that will be placed inside the application.

The Chennai and US-based company, which currently relies on subscription revenues, plans to set up an ad engine which will deliver advertisements to magazines hosted on the application.

“We want to become a reading destination like what YouTube is for videos and Google is for search,” said Girish Ramdas, CEO of Magzter, who expects the new model to deliver 70% of revenue with the balance coming from subscriptions.

The company which now offers over 3,500 magazines from more than 1,000 publishers will also introduce a news feed and books to its library of content. In doing so, Magzter whose CEO claims it does not have any direct competition, will compete with the likes of Amazon and social magazine application Flipboard.

Global mobile advertising spending is forecast to reach $18 billion in 2014 and $41.9 billion by 2017, says Gartner.