Fox Traveller to increase local content by 50 per cent

The channel will focus on food, lifestyle and adventure genres for the India-centric content in the coming year. A high-definition channel, Fox traveller HD, was launched recently.

In an effort to increase its relevance for the Indian audience, English infotainment channel Fox Traveller plans to increase its local content by 50 per cent. Now, the channel telecasts 40 hours of India-centric content, which will be raised to 60 hours per month.

The content will focus on local food, lifestyle and adventure genres. The channel telecasts around 240 hours of fresh programming each month, which means about eight hours of original content per day.

The channel has completed a year in India on October, 30. Launched last year with the philosophy 'This Journey is Fun', the channel is already available in Hindi, English, Tamil and Bangla feeds in India. It targets the new-age, Gen X audience, claims the channel.

It was originally launched in November, 2008 as Fox History & Entertainment and was renamed as Fox History & Traveller in May, 2011. Further, it was re-christened as Fox Traveller in October, 2011. Currently, the channel is available in India and various South Asian countries including Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

The channel also launched a high definition version, called Fox Traveller HD, recently. The programming line up of the HD channel is different from the existing Fox Traveller. The new channel has shows such as Eat Street, French Food Safari, David Rocco's Amalfi Getaway and Latin Angels.

Meanwhile, a few new categories of advertisers have been added to the channel. Keertan Adyanthaya, managing director, FOX International Channels, says, "The new categories of the advertisers are the ready to eat foods like McCain Foods and Lays and tourism boards like Australia and South Africa. We are focused to bring in more India-based content."

In the wake of digitisation, the channel is ready to partner with more digital platforms. Adyanthaya adds, "We will need a renewed focus on our distribution and we will look at partnering with digital platforms to let audiences sample our channel in order to get them to subscribe to it."