Mumbai: 'Friendly foreign investment' makes India rank as one of the top three players for global collaboration in entertainment and media, says PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), a professional services firm. "There is no question that India is within all the companies that I speak to, it is either number one, two or three that they talk to us about India," said Marcel Fenez, Global Managing Partner, Entertainment and Media Practice with PwC.

The country is expected to grow 18.5 percent a year to reach $36 billion by 2012, while the Asian industry will likely grow 8.8 percent a year over the next five years to $508 billion. Moreover, according to PwC's Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2008-2012, a double digit annual growth is projected for every segment except some areas of publishing. Philippe Dauman, President and CEO Viacom said, "India is one of Viacom's priority markets for expansion internationally," as it joined TV18, for a new 50/50 joint venture operation in India, Viacom-18.

India has witnessed prominent collaborations in India. Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group's (ADAG) joint venture with Bollywood actor Amitabh Bachchan's company AB Corp.'s and Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks SKG, Eros International and White Feather Films' joint production deal of 15 films outlaying Rs.250 crore, UTV's 15 percent stake in Walt Disney are some of the significant deals.

Apart from India, other emerging markets like Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Turkey and Pakistan have been noticed in the entertainment and media sector. Fenez said, "You do get these big players who will by definition tend to do large deals but you also see a lot of smaller investments and a large number of them that will become increasingly important because those will tend to be emerging media."