Live entertainment, sports becoming favourites for the youth, says BookMyShow CEO Ashish Hemrajani

Live entertainment and sports are becoming big forms of entertainment for the youth, BookMyShow founder and chief executive Ashish Hemrajani said on Tuesday.

“Roti kapada makan is done, discerning people have got the money. Now they're focusing on outside of science and maths. They are focusing on art, they are focusing on music, they are focusing on sport," he said on the second day of Startup Mahakumbh in New Delhi.

According to Hemrajani, these spaces are becoming commercial as well.


“In cricket, except for the 11 players, nobody else made money. Today, with the Indian Premier League (IPL), Women's Premier League (WPL), and other formats, there is a far larger industry out there, which I think is spawning an entire new generation, with more people considering it as a career choice,” he added.

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ET reported early December that BookMyShow's operating revenue surged to Rs 976 crore in FY23, a significant increase from Rs 277 crore in FY22.

The platform saw significant growth in its live events business, with revenue from these events soaring to Rs 237 crore from Rs 25 crore in FY22.

“We decided to jump into the live event space because we wanted to disrupt that and we created that for the youth and the younger demographic of India,” said Hemrajani.

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While there was initial concern that OTT platforms would kill theatricals, after Covid 19, OTT platforms took advantage of theatrical by investing heavily in content, he said.

“It created an entire new industry of creators of directors, screenwriters and musicians, and they now get real economic value coming out of a theatrical release,” Hemrajani said.

In a move to cater to the growing interest in live events, food delivery platform Zomato also ventured into the live events booking segment and shared metrics for its going-out business for the first time in November.
Its going-out business, which includes dining out and events, reported a revenue of Rs 49 crore for the September quarter, an 88% year-on-year growth.