FICCI Frames 2025: OTT Platforms Are Bridging Regional and National Cinema, Say Industry

New Delhi / Mumbai, October 13, 2025 — At a panel organized under FICCI Frames 2025, industry experts asserted that OTT platforms have become the connective tissue between India’s regional and national film industries, enabling stories from smaller languages to find pan-India audiences. 

The session titled “Platform Shifts & Uncharted Story-Scapes: New Frontiers of Creativity and Distribution” spotlighted how evolving digital distribution and audience behavior are dissolving traditional barriers in Indian cinema. Key speaker Siddharth Roy Kapur remarked, “We’re in uncharted waters — platforms are changing, distribution models are shifting, audiences are evolving, and technology like AI is presenting unpredictable developments.” 

Streaming as the Great Unifier

Panelists underscored how OTT services allow films made in Kannada, Marathi, Malayalam, Tamil, Bengali, and other languages to be discovered nationwide. Filmmaker Kiran Rao emphasized, “Streaming has helped us discover all the cinemas of our country — earlier, we’d heard of these films but never had a way to watch them.” 

With subtitling and dubbing becoming more seamless, the linguistic walls are weakening. Audiences are now exploring content across language silos, aided by recommendations and algorithmic curation. An OTT team executive noted that a Tamil film making waves in the Hindi belt is no longer an anomaly but increasingly expected.

Business Models & Content Strategy

Platforms are adjusting their content strategies to reflect this cross-pollination. Rather than strictly pulling in national blockbusters, many are commissioning or licensing regional content with crossover potential. Regional stars and stories are gaining visibility through dubbed versions or subtitles.

One notable collaboration in October: CloudTV, a smart TV operating system, joined hands with Prasar Bharati’s WAVES OTT to push public service and cultural programming to connected TVs (across many languages). This move underlines efforts to make regional content democratically accessible. 

Experts also flagged the necessity of metadata, tagging, and localization to make regional content discoverable. Without those, gems risk remaining invisible.

Challenges & Resistance

However, bridging comes with friction. Some regional producers fear dilution of local identity when their content is adapted or marketed for all-India appeal. Others worry about royalty structures, negotiating fair revenue shares when content crosses states.

Audience fatigue is another concern — oversaturation of dubbed or subtitled releases might lead viewers to retreat to their mother tongue content. There’s also the risk of algorithmic bias, where only a few big regional titles get visibility, while many others remain obscure.

Moreover, regulatory and licensing complexities across state and national boundaries can complicate revenue-sharing models and copyrights.

What’s Next

Panelists agreed that the next frontier is deeper integration — not just translations, but truly co-produced content that blends regional roots with universal themes. Formats like anthology series with episodes in different languages, and cross-industry collaborations (e.g. Tamil + Marathi producers) were floated as possible experiments.

Another key trend: leveraging AI tools to generate localized versions — e.g. auto-dub, auto-subtitling — to reduce turnaround time and cost.

Bottom Line

The narrative of India’s cinema is no longer fragmented by geography and language. OTT platforms are stitching together diverse film cultures, allowing regional cinema to transcend borders and national cinema to become more inclusive. The terrain is still evolving, with challenges around identity, monetization, and discovery. But if the trends from FICCI’s panel are any guide, India’s film industries are heading into a future where language is a bridge, not a barrier.

---

SRESTHA ROY - AUTHOR

Srestha is a film writer who explores cinema through sharp reviews, insightful news, and in-depth features. From the magic of the big screen to behind-the- scenes stories, she brings readers closer to the art and industry of film.