Case study of Ekta Kapoor Ekta Kapoor was said to be the face and brain of Balaji Telefilms Telefilms Limited (BTL), and was almost solely responsible responsible for the phenomenal phenomenal success of most of BTL's serials serials !ccordin" !ccordin" to Ekta, her childhood was #materially easy but emotionally difficult# !s a child she was e$tremely obese and suffered from low self%esteem &he was a poor student student and was happy to "et by with the minimum minimum pass marks Een as a child she was an aid teleision watcher and spent most of her free time "lued to the T &he felt "uilty about lettin" her parents down, but was unable to do anythin" about it The turnin" point in Ekta Kapoor's life came in the early **+s when a non resident ndian, Ketan &omayya, approached her father and re-uested him to make some software for the channel he wanted to start Ekta's father asked her to take up the responsibility of makin" the software .onse-uently, Ekta Kapoor made si$ pilots, of about three episodes each, at a cost of about /s +0 million The proposed channel, howeer, did not fare well and had to be sold to 1ee T 2ot wantin" to waste her efforts, Ekta Kapoor started lookin" for other buyers for her pilots &he was not successful in findin" buyers for the first pilots, but her father came to her rescue and "ae her more money to make more pilots BTL was set up in **3 by her father 4ano 5a 2a 4ano, (Beliee t or 2ot) BTL's first serial was telecast in **0 This was followed by 6hun 6hama 6hamaka ka (4us (4usic ical al E$pl E$plos osio ion) n),, a musi musicc base based d show show aire aired d on 6oord 6oordar arsh shan an,, whic which h was was moderately successful The first major success came with 7um 8aanch (9e :ie), a comic sitcom about 0 "irls and their harassed parents, which ran for 0 years on 1ee T BTL came out with an initial public offer (8;) in ;ctober <+++ to set up an inte"rated studio in 4umbai and to buy adanced e-uipment ! day prior to its listin" on B&E, BTL entered into ne"otiations with 2ine 2etwork Entertainment ndia 8t Ltd (a wholly%owned subsidiary of 2ine Broadcastin" ndia 8t Ltd) for a mer"er in the ratio of =0><++ throu"h an all%share deal The mer"er was later called off n its first year as a public company, Balaji showed a net profit of /s =3= million on net sales of /s?30 billion for the nine month period endin" in 6ecember <+++ The initial years in the business were not ery easy for Ekta Kapoor There were times when she used to hae 0 or = pilots ready but none of them would "et approal from the channels 8eople did not take her seriously E$perienced writers would try to force her to accept sub%standard scripts as they thou"ht she was the #brainless dau"hter of a moneyed father# &he
was able to oercome these barriers throu"h sheer "rit and determination &he worked relentlessly, een fore"oin" holidays, to make a mark for herself 7er time was completely occupied with thinkin" out stories, finali@in" scripts, decidin" on sets, costumes, castin", etc 8eople welcomed this theme as they were fed up with stories about e$tramarital affairs They wanted feel%"ood serials with which they could identify, and Ekta Kapoor "ae them what they wanted 4ost of BTL's serials featured re"ularly in the top ten pro"rams and, almost without e$ception, enjoyed hi"h iewership ratin"s Ekta Kapoor mana"ed to chan"e the concept of prime time teleision when she made +>?+ pm a prime time slot 9hen she chose +>?+ as the slot for K&BKBT, Ekta Kapoor did not e$pect the serial to become so popular Till then, prime time on teleision was between A>++ and *>?+ pm !fter that, people had their dinners and went to bed But after K&BKBT became popular, people chan"ed their teleision iewin" habits and +>?+ pm became a hi"h iewership slot &ince Ekta Kapoor was the creatie head of BTL, most of the successes of the company could be traced back to her
&he sourced the concept of K&BKBT from a short story she read in a ma"a@ine BTL productions were laishly presented and slickly marketed 4ost its new serials could easily sail throu"h on the basis of its past successes, but Ekta Kapoor ensured that nothin" was left to chance &he adertised constantly to create isibility n fact, she een made some of the characters in her serials praise other serials :or instance, some of the characters in the serials are shown discussin" her other serials or finishin" housework -uickly to catch up with them 7er uni-ue style of namin" the serials (all names started with K and all the titles were structured in a stran"e manner) also drew the attention of iewers &he was once adised by an astrolo"er that the letter 'K' would be lucky for her !s a result, she started namin" all her serials with K !ccordin" to Ekta, ninety percent of her serials be"innin" with that letter hae been successful, so she does not see the need to chan"e the practice ;n the human resources front, Ekta Kapoor seemed to be somethin" of an autocrat &he yelled at her subordinates as she belieed that if she did not shout, thin"s would not "et done &he was also completely indifferent to star status and e$pected all the actors in her serials to toe her line
n addition, the actors were also employed on a contractual basis which "ae the producer more control oer them This contract system also helped BTL reduce costs n <++, Kapoor was selected by the .onfederation of ndian ndustries, (.) to head the committee on entertainment &he also receied a number of awards in the early <st century &ome of the awards are> ;ne of #!sia's 0+ most 8owerful .ommunicators,# from !sia week ma"a@ine in <++ Ernst and 5oun" Entrepreneur of the 5ear in <++ #.orporate E$cellence# from Bharat 8etroleum in <++< and #/aji Candhi !ward# in <++< The entrepreneurial style of Ekta Kapoor may smack of authoritarianism, but analysts felt her refusal to compromise on -uality and her attention to detail contributed "reatly to her success 7er perfectionism seemed to hae helped make BTL one of the most powerful teleision software companies of the <+++s
Duestions > 9hat is the turnin" point in the career of Ekta Kapoor < 9hat are the major findin"s of this case study ? 9hat are the lessons that an women entrepreneurs can "et from this story 3 9hat are the key themes of success in her career 0 !ll the factors are not controlled by academic knowled"e but by creatiity .omment this statement on the basis of aboe case study