Focus of FICCI-FRAMES 2015: Making India 'entertainment superpower'

Mumbai, March 22 (IANS) The three-day FICCI FRAMES 2015, Asia's annual global convention on entertainment and media business starting March 25, will focus on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'Make in India' campaign, woman power and importance of digitisation.

The convention, which will bring leaders, entrepreneurs, creative artists, government officials, industry leaders and diplomats from across the globe under one roof, will take place at Hotel Renaissance.

With the theme 'Making India the Global Entertainment Superpower', the convention is expected to be inaugurated by Finance and Information and Broadcasting Minister Arun Jaitley.

Other important leaders who will address the convention are Maharashtra's chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore.

With over 3,000 Indian and 800 foreign delegates attending, the industry's annual meeting will churn out ideas to make the theme a reality.

Along with it, keynotes, plenary and parallel sessions on a broad spectrum will be held on issues covering the entire gamut of entertainment sector comprising of films, broadcast (TV and radio), digital entertainment, animation, gaming and visual effects.

Jyotsyna Suri, president of FICCI, has emphasised on how technology is taking over all the sectors of business, ushering in more opportunities.

"We are now on the cusp of a galloping change with the digital age opening up a world of boundless opportunity, bringing creative minds, industry, government, entrepreneurs, research, and all other stakeholders together," Suri said in a statement.

Another highlight of the convention -- the first FICCI Women in Media Forum -- will also be launched by popular TV journalist Barkha Dutt.

The forum will take forward FICCI's ideology of working towards gender equality and ridding the industry of gender bias. It will encourage exchange of knowledge and ideas and would aim to represent women to relevant policy-makers on issues pertaining to employment terms and practices in the media and entertainment sector.

The FICCI-KPMG report, replete with the analysis of 2014 trends and projections for the next five years, will also be released on the first day of the three-day event.

Hollywood studio Relativity's founder and CEO Ryan Kavananugh will address the audience on 'Make in India: A revolutionary new model for Hollywood and Bollywood', setting the tone for the making of India as the global entertainment nerve centre, on the first day of FICCI FRAMES.

He will be joined by actor Irrfan Khan who has made space in Hollywood with films like "Life of Pi" and "The Amazing Spider-Man".

On the second day, an entrepreneurship track of the convention will deal with funding and bringing angel investors, VCs and mentoring to industry professionals and aspirants on a one-on-one basis.

A unique initiative called 'FrameUrIdea' will help scriptmakers to get face-time with key decision makers.

An interesting conundrum now emerging in the space between the telecom and broadcast industries will also be topic of discussion on day two.

The third day will be celebrated as 'Digital Media Day'.

Digital spearheading companies such as MGo, Vimeo, Jabong.com, Yahoo, YouTube, apart from industry leaders - Star, ZEE, Viacom, Disney, agencies such as GroupM, Dentsu, will also share their perspectives in sessions on day three.

Talking about the glamour part of the convention, a tribute to creative imagination will be paid at the Director's Masterclass with filmmakers RajkumarHirani and Sudhir Mishra.

And from the young brigade, Arjun Kapoor, Ayushmann Khurrana and Vikas Bahl will talk about the new edgy Bollywood.