Introduction

Started in 1967 by Shri Anand Pai, Amar Chitra Katha (Immortal Picture Story) became one of the
leading comic series companies within a few years of its inception in India. They have been
consistent with their motive of spreading Indian history, culture, and mythology among the younger
generations of India through affordable and attractive comic books. Their titles have covered Indian
mythology, Indian personalities, fantasy tales etc.

What should ACK’s strategy to survive in the current industry structure be?

To survive in the current industry, ACK (Amar Chitra Katha) needs to cope with the trends and gain
access to media platforms that provide a better reach. For this it needs to follow the following
options:

Market Research: Regular study of market demand is crucial for ensuring product sustainability,
for which ACK should conduct market research targeted at deriving three points:

 Changing interests of customers: Insights into the current trends among the children would
help in gaining traction and would also help us to know about the current interests. According
to the results, ACK needs to expand its team of artists and editors to focus on creating fresh
and new characters. Expanding the team would also ensure the constant supply of ideas and
will help in increasing efficiency.

 Willingness to pay: Recently, children have been shifting towards western culture and are
becoming increasingly unaware of Indian history and mythology. This would be an incentive
for ACK to leverage their brand name and expertise in Indian history, culture, and mythology
in creating the demand for their products. With the inclusion of new titles and expansion of
the supply line, there will be a shift in willingness to pay by the parents to provide better
content to their children.

 Gain traction through advertising and digital marketing: ACK has great customer reach
through bookstalls and libraries. However, with time, their brand name has diminished due to
newer competitors with fresh content. They need to display the need to impart cultural and
historical importance in children’s lives. To gain the attention of parents, ACK needs to
advertise themselves as a source of knowledge for their children and use digital platforms as
it is widely used and is a cheap source of reaching a wider community.

Entering Digital Media: To reach to the new generations, it is necessary to adapt according to the
changing platforms and forms of entertainment. ACK needs to position itself as a source of
‘Infotainment’. This strategy will need them to enter trending media, preferably through inorganic
investments. Some ways to expand into digital media would be:

 Through collaboration with OTT platforms: ACK should partner with OTT platforms like
Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hotstar, Voot, etc. to create video series of creations like Chacha
Chaudhary, Tinkle, Jackle stories, etc. This will help them with the budget constraints that
they faced earlier in animation and provide them with the network of creators for example
Netflix, which has its own animation team. Through partnership they can earn royalties for
providing OTT creators with ACK’s exclusive story content and characters which are
patented by them and has an already established recognition. These serials will mainly focus
 on kids, while also targeting adults to provide a nostalgic feel of their childhood comic
characters.

 Through collaboration with TV channels: They should partner with Cartoon TV channels
to produce a TV series based on different stories of ACK’s production. This way they earn
revenue from royalties through their exclusive characters and storylines from ACK’s comics.

We recommend ACK should collaborate with OTT platforms as OTT’s subscribers are rising day by
day, has a wider viewership.

Bundling and cross-selling: To increase the sale, ACK should try to sell their comics as a bundle.
Also, to promote customers to try different titles, its should bundle different titles together and sell
them at a lower price. This will encourage the customers to buy more comics of the titles that they
liked and will provide a holistic view of their collection. The two ways to bundle will be:

 Series of the same title: This will allow customers to read through the titles of their liking at
lower prices while increasing the sales at the same time.

 Different titles bundling together: This will allow different titles to be sold in a pack to
provide options to the buyer and then follow whichever title they like through the above-
mentioned bundling.

What are the various avenues they should invest in?

ACK needs to maintain pace with the developing culture in India. This demands it to explore other
avenues for upholding its mission of spreading Indian culture, history and mythology among younger
generations. For this, they should enter into the following markets:

 Audio books (through Amazon Audible): ACK runs a YouTube channel that displays short
story videos. They should leverage this recorded material to gain traction through audio
books. Audio recordings will help in generating profit as well as traction for their brand.

 E-books (through Kindle): ACK should use the wide reader community of e-book
platforms to sell its products in digital format. This will be done easily with the help of
content developers of these platforms. It will add to their revenue streams and help them in
diversifying.

 Collaborating with Toy companies: ACK should extend their copyrights of famous
characters like Chacha Choudhary, Sabu, etc. to allow toy companies to produce them and
sell through their distribution channels. Toy companies like FunSkool and Natkhat will pay
licensing and royalty costs per toy to ACK.

 Quizbooks for children: ACK should leverage its producing capabilities to add quizbooks
for school libraries and markets in their production units. These quizbooks will include
questionnaire and image identification problems for children based on Indian culture, history
and mythology.

 Gaming Application: Introduce a gaming application that will contain short quizzes on the
 characters from the Amar Chitra Katha so that the children will be able to connect with the Indian
culture more easily and arouse curiosity around the stories and mythologies. ACK can generate
revenue from advertising on the app.

What should their New Product Development strategy be for the new age?