Zee Entertainment reports consolidated net profit of ₹299 crore in Q3

Indian Media conglomerate Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited (ZEEL) on Wednesday reported a 25% year-on-year decline in consolidated net profit at ₹299 crore for the quarter ended 31 December 2021. The company had reported a net profit of ₹400 crore in the year-ago period.

ZEEL’s consolidated total income dips by 23% to ₹2,130 crore compared to ₹2,757 crore in the previous year, the company said in a regulatory filing. The company’s EBITDA, or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization are down by 24.8% to ₹479 crore, while the EBITDA margin fell by 330 basis points to 22.7%.

ZEEL’s entertainment channel Zee5’s monthly active users (MAU) inclined to 101.9 million “with steadily growing engagement.”

The entertainment company posted that its gained market share in Hindi GEC on the back of new launches. It also notified that it “strengthened leadership position” in Bengali and Kannada.

Earlier in December Sony Pictures Networks India Pvt Ltd (SPNI) and Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL) clarified that they have signed definitive agreements for their merger following the conclusion of an exclusive negotiation period during which both parties conducted mutual due diligence after an intense boardroom drama prior to the merger.

In a joint statement, the two companies endorsed they had ”signed definitive agreements to merge ZEEL with and into SPNI and sum up their linear networks, digital assets, production operations and program libraries”. The agreements follow the conclusion of an exclusive negotiation period during which ZEEL and SPNI conducted mutual due diligence.

When the merger deal was declared in September, the two networks had stated that Sony would invest $1.575 billion and hold a 52.93% stake in the merged entity and Zee the remaining 47.07%.

Q3 Zee Entertainment