After the success of its Cartoon Network Channel, Turner International is launching a slew of initiatives to strengthen its new kids' channel 'POGO', which includes increasing Hindi content to 80 per cent by this year-end and having programmes in vernacular languages like Telugu and Tamil.
The children's entertainment market was witnessing a healthy growth and currently enjoyed a total advertising spend of Rs 100 crore (Rs 1 billion), Turner International managing director Anshuman Mishra told newspersons in New Delhi.
"The number of channels for kids are very few in India and we believe there is a huge untapped market. According to market figures, currently 20.1 million children are watching these channels in C&S homes," he said.
As part of brand-building exercise, the channel will be screening the popular movie 'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone' later this month and would be investing in cross-channel promotions, advertisement in leading dailies, trade magazines as well as in kids-specific publications.
POGO will also be targeted at adults, though in a limited way.
Launched on January 1, 2004 and distributed by Zee Turner Pvt Ltd, POGO offers programming from production, which includes Ragdoll Ltd, BBC and HIT International PLC.
Its product portfolio includes programmes like 'Mr Bean', 'Barney & Friends', 'Teletubbies', 'The Walking With Series', 'The New Adventure of Superman', 'Brum' and 'Hi-5'.
