Is entertainment poised to become the next massive export engine for India, mirroring the historic boom of the IT sector? Saurabh Pandey, Founder and CEO of the EloElo Group, certainly believes so. In a compelling keynote session at FICCI FRAMES today, titled "The Future of Entertainment: AI, Scale, Storytelling," Pandey outlined a bold vision where microdrama and artificial intelligence converge to elevate Indian entertainment onto the global stage. The session set out how technology is actively changing what gets made, how audiences prefer to watch, and exactly where Indian entertainment is headed next.

The Evolution of Screen Consumption

Pandey kicked off his address by tracing the fascinating evolution of how audiences consume screen entertainment. He noted that while cinema made viewing a special event and television transformed it into a daily habit, OTT platforms eventually put content on demand. This progression was subsequently followed by the rise of short-form video, which made content highly snackable. Now, the industry is witnessing the next logical step: microdrama, a format specifically built for daily commutes and short breaks. This format signals a significant shift away from user-generated clips toward professionally produced vertical content.

Saurabh Pandey, Founder and CEO of EloElo Group, delivering his keynote address at FICCI FRAMES.
Saurabh Pandey addressing the FICCI FRAMES audience on the future of entertainment and AI.

Drawing a culturally resonant parallel to cricket, Pandey compared this content evolution to the transition from Test matches to ODIs, and ultimately to T20s. He declared that microdrama is effectively the quick-commerce moment for the entertainment industry. Historically in India, each time a format has become faster, the overall category has grown significantly bigger.

India's Rapidly Expanding Market

The statistics supporting this behavioral shift are staggering. Globally, microdrama is already a USD 15 billion category, currently spearheaded by China and followed closely by the United States. However, India has rapidly emerged as the fastest-growing market for this format. Pandey revealed that microdrama app downloads within the country have now reached roughly 60 to 65 percent of traditional OTT downloads. Furthermore, users are deeply engaged, spending between 60 to 70 minutes a day on these dedicated apps. Citing data from Redseer and Lumikai, the CEO estimated the current Indian market to be worth USD 600 to 700 million. He noted that it is on a rapid trajectory to hit the USD 3 billion mark within three to four years, carrying the massive potential to eventually overtake the traditional Indian film industry.

The Growth Engine: Vernacular Languages and Story TV

Regional languages are serving as the primary growth engine for this digital boom. Story TV began its operations in Hindi and has since expanded rapidly into Tamil, Telugu, Bhojpuri, Kannada, and Malayalam. Within just 12 months, the platform has successfully built an extensive library boasting more than 5,000 microdramas. The platform has crossed the impressive 120 million user milestone, with these highly engaged users watching for over 100 minutes each day.

Solving the Scale Problem with Artificial Intelligence

As consumer demand surged, production naturally struggled to keep pace. Story TV was churning out about 100 shows a month, but the audience appetite demanded 200 to 250. Artificial Intelligence became the crucial mechanism to close this massive gap. AI significantly cut production costs and shortened the valuable time required to test out new creative ideas. It also paved the way for innovative hybrid formats that blend live actors with AI-generated backdrops. This breakthrough made previously expensive genres, such as period dramas, entirely viable even on tight microdrama budgets. The end result is a highly efficient flywheel effect where every single idea seamlessly moves from script to video, and the resulting audience performance data directly shapes the next round of production. Thanks to this AI integration, Story TV now successfully produces 250 shows every month.

Enter Dolphin AI: Revolutionizing Video Creation

To further revolutionize this space, the keynote also marked the introduction of Dolphin AI, a tool built specifically to fix the major problems creators currently face with AI video generation. Dolphin AI targets persistent issues such as lost context, locations that inexplicably drop out between shots, and props that change from one scene to the next. Prior to its public launch, the Eloelo team rigorously tested the platform by generating about 48,000 videos internally.

According to Pandey, Dolphin AI operates across three distinct operational layers:

  • It offers hundreds of presets designed specifically for first-time creators making user-generated content (UGC), social media clips, and tutorial videos.
  • It features a conversational chat-based agent that seamlessly turns a creative brief into a finished video.
  • It provides a comprehensive studio workflow suite for professional creators making long-form content and drama series, which actively works alongside existing industry tools such as Claude and n8n.

Dolphin AI is now open for early access globally and can be found at trydolphin.ai.

"AI video could make entertainment the next major export from India, much as IT services became in the 1990s."

Powering the Orange Economy

In his closing remarks, Pandey contextualized this technological leap within a broader national narrative. He stated that AI video technology could empower entertainment to become India's next major export, much like IT services became in the 1990s. Thanks to these advancements, Indian creators now possess the tools to produce compelling content tailored to the languages of other global markets, entirely without the need for large, expensive production teams. Pandey ultimately framed this shift as the driving force powering the Orange Economy of India, ensuring that the human creator remains firmly at the center of the creative process.