Onyx Takes Hungama, YRF To Court Over IPR Claims
By Cerius Shah - Wed 26 Mar 2008 12:25 PM PST
The Kareena Kapoor - Saif Ali Khan starrer Tashan (English: Style) appears to be running into hot water with Onyx dragging Hungama and Yash Raj Films (YRF) to court over an alleged breach of contract.
The matter, up for hearing on March 31, refers to a joint-venture YRF entered into with Onyx in 2007 for download rights of the movie’s wallpapers, caller tunes and music. According to HT, YRF terminated the contract and entered into one with Hungama, which has subsequently released the content. Now Onyx wants Hungama to take the content back and Hungama states that it can’t pull back what’s already in the public domain.
One can’t quite help but wonder what role Hungama has to play in the T-Series vs Youtube drama, considering it stands the most to lose. Piracy is a much abused term in the industry and a large misnomer. Take for example this trailer of Tashan on Youtube, while both YRF and T-Series are active in the ‘Take Down Notice’ scene on Youtube, selective amnesia regarding pull back of content in the public domain has choked fair use proliferation of a very large amount of Bollywood content. Regardless, the main feature film still usually gets pirated merely hours after theatrical release.
Notice I just checked with Saleem Mobhani, COO of Hungama, and he says the comments to this post by a “saleem” are not by him. Readers should take this comment as an anonymous comment, and refrain from any defamatory statements. On request, we’re closing comments to this post.
Posted in: Companies, Hungama, Movies, Bollywood, Music
I think there is a typo shouldnt it read onyx (http://www.onyxmobile.com/)
There is a typo but that appears only on the main page - this page reads OnYx but still the url says 419-onIx-takes…
hungama is the largetst and the best digital entertainment company in india. they had the guts to pay 1.5cr as MG to YashRaj which onyx could not have dreamed to earn in 10 years. Imagine the deal making capabilities where hm could have received more than half of the MG money from airtel or hutch for exclusivity and then recover more later on from other players..
Saleem,
i think we are getting a little too excited here.Paying MG’s for either T Series content or Yash Raj content and waiting inordinately to make money seems like too short term a strategy.
Indian Digital entertainment companies are in a space where the entry costs is practically non existent , any corner shop can become a content aggregator , the operator continues to have a the upperhand and product innovation is close to zero.
The one company that has been at least trying to do things a little differently is an Onmobile
Saleem M ( or so i guess ) - wouldnt it be great if HM also shares the money pending to partners
- and then claim - Best and other adjectives 
Guts I agree taking SIMCA head on!!
And I agree on deal making capabilities also but disagree on J on the innovation front of OnMobile. But J is spot on the long term strategy but SM is right too as half the money is from Operators.
Ho !
Here goes the ways, methods and capability of hungama open in public.
I wish, Rajan Patel also reads this and shares some knowledge on his business with YRF.
Hail Hungama. Doing business of royalty collection and calling it a digital content play
What a digital age dalali !