Imagine binge-watching a TV drama, but every episode is just two minutes long and filmed vertically for your phone. That is a microdrama, and 118 million Indians now watch them every month, on EloElo. The format this app is bringing has grown so fast that Hollywood is now pouring money into it.
Indian startup EloElo just raised $80 million in a Series C round. NBCUniversal, the American media giant behind Universal Studios, led the investment alongside Hornbill Capital. The deal values EloElo at $500 million and brings its total funding to $130 million. The company operates StoryTV, one of India’s most popular microdrama platforms. Think of it as Netflix but built entirely for mobile screens. Each show runs as a series of bite-sized episodes lasting one to three minutes each. Users swipe through them vertically, much like scrolling through Instagram Reels or TikTok.
The engagement numbers explain why NBCUniversal got interested. StoryTV draws over 33 million monthly active users currently. More impressively, those users spend an average of 95 minutes daily on the app. They return multiple times throughout the day between tasks.
Former Flipkart executive Saurabh Pandey founded the company in 2020. He now offers over 5,000 titles across six Indian languages. The content spans drama, thriller, romance, and family storylines. A partnership with Balaji Telefilms, one of India’s biggest production houses, fuels original shows.
“I fundamentally believe that the next billion users will probably not grow up on a diet of watching television; they will grow up on a diet of watching content on their phones, right? And this content has to be, and this entertainment, designed very differently. It’s not going to be appointment viewing. It’s going to be within certain slots throughout the day. And a lot of this was earlier solved for short clips, but serialized storytelling was never solved,” Pandey said about the microdrama format.
However, making money from microdramas remains genuinely challenging. The platform offers monthly, quarterly, and yearly subscription plans. It also runs free, ad-supported content alongside premium titles. Yet reports suggest only 15 to 17 million Indians actually pay monthly. Most viewers stick to the free tier and never convert.
Despite that, analysts remain bullish on the opportunity ahead. The Indian microdrama market could reach $3 to $4 billion annually by 2030. India’s billion-plus internet population makes that projection plausible.
EloElo is also building AI tools for faster content production. Its Dolphin AI platform helps creators edit, generate visuals, and produce videos. However, Pandey insists the best stories still need a human creative director. He compared AI to a powerful engine that still needs a skilled driver steering.
For Pakistani audiences who frequently mass-consume Indian content, the trend offers an interesting new outlet. South Asia’s appetite for mobile-first, serialized entertainment keeps growing, which means there might be more to it that Bollywood offers. As smartphone penetration deepens, this format could eventually cross borders, pushing our drama industry to follow suit.
