From Hong Kong to Bollywood: Digital Domain opens India studio to expand visual effects business
Hong Kong-based owner of Oscar-winning visual effects house Digital Domain 3.0 opens its 10th studio in Hyderabad
Digital Domain Holdings, which runs the world’s largest independent visual effects company, is ramping up its international expansion with the opening of a new studio in India, a market that produces an average of 1,900 films a year.
The Hong Kong-listed firm’s facility in Hyderabad, capital of the southern Indian state of Telangana, marks the 10th studio location for its Digital Domain 3.0 unit – the 24-year-old, Oscar-winning visual effects house originally founded by Hollywood film director James Cameron in 1993.
The latest studio was opened on Monday in Hyderabad’s IT/ITES Special Economic Zone campus, where technology companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and Google also have operations.
Its expansion initiative further bolsters the government’s “Make in India” programme, which was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014 to encourage more foreign direct investment and to support 25 key sectors – including media and entertainment.
India is the world’s largest producer of films, an industry that online research firm Statista has forecast to be worth 206.6 billion rupees (US$3.2 billion) by 2021.
The country surpassed the United States in the quarter ended September 30 to become the world’s second-largest market for smartphones behind mainland China, according to research company Canalys.