PVR Premiere, with its luxurious movie-watching experience, will be launched in Mumbai within a year, said PVR chairman Ajay Bijli.
NEW DELHI: Cinema chain operator PVR, which launched its `premiere’ brand in the capital on Thursday, is planning to invest anything between Rs 300 crore and Rs 400 crore in three years to set up 250 new screens across 30 cities in the country.
It could be funded by a combination of debt, equity and internal accruals. With the launch of “PVR Premiere” in New Delhi, the chain now has 95 screens across 24 complexes in 14 cities in the country.
PVR Premiere, with its luxurious movie-watching experience, will be launched in Mumbai within a year, said PVR chairman and managing director Ajay Bijli at a press conference on Thursday.
Besides Mumbai, the premiere brand is expected to be introduced in five other places including Gurgaon, Bangalore, Kolkata and Chennai over the next two years or so.
It is estimated that within five years, 15-20% of the total PVR screens will be premiere, Bijli said.
PVR Premiere tickets would range anything between Rs 150 and Rs 750. However, the chain is likely to introduce flexi-pricing in many parts of the country, whereby a discount of 30% to 35% would be given on morning show tickets on a weekday. Flexi ticket pricing is a widely used international practice. But PVR officials pointed out that the chain is not just picking up trends from the international cinema industry, but also from airline and hotel groups abroad.
When asked whether PVR would look at international expansion, Bijli said: “No, there’s so much to do in India itself.”
He also denied that his group faced any threat from competition, saying that “there’s room for so many”.
Although for some time to come, single screens and multiplexes could co-exist in India, the scenario may change after five years in favour of multiplexes, he indicated.
Replying to media query on the possibility of international partnerships, a PVR official said that nothing like that is on the agenda. However, he added, that the PVR group would not be closed to the idea of a partnership if any international company approached it in future and “if it is lucrative to our shareholders”.
The multiplex industry has been witnessing an annual growth of 40%. It is estimated that a similar growth pattern would continue for another five years or so in the country.
Currently, there are around 600 multiplex screens across the country. While it takes around Rs 80 lakh to Rs 1.2 crore to set up “Talkies”, a PVR brand of theatres that’s prevalent in tier-2 towns, multiplex cinemas cost around Rs 2 crore each. It is estimated that around Rs 24 crore was spent on setting up the Premiere brand theatre in New Delhi.
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