Gramophone Company of India
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| Public | |
| Industry | Retail |
| Founded | 13 August 1946 (The Gramophone Company), 3 November 2000 (Saregama) |
| Headquarters | Kolkata and Mumbai, India |
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Area served
|
Global |
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Key people
|
Vikram Mehra (MD) |
| Parent | RPSG Group |
| Website | http://www.saregama.com/ |
Saregama India Ltd., a RPSG Group company, is India’s oldest music label, youngest film studio and a multi-language TV content producer.
The company started operations in 1901 and produced the first song recorded in India. Today it has in-perpetuity global ownership of both sound recording and publishing copyrights of the largest and most coveted Indian music catalogue across 14 different languages. It also owns over 4000 hours of content IP produced for various Indian TV channels. The company monetizes its content through various B2B partnerships and direct-to-customer initiatives.
Saregama's head office is located in Mumbai, with other offices in Kolkata, Delhi and Chennai. It is listed on the and .
In 1901, operations started as the first overseas branch of Electrical & Musical Industries Limited, EMI London.
The company was incorporated on 13 August 1946 with the name of ‘The Gramophone Co. (India) Limited'. The name of the Company was subsequently changed to ‘The Gramophone Co. of India Limited' effective 1 April 1956. It was converted into a public company on 28 October 1968 and consequently the name of the company was changed to ‘The Gramophone Company of India Limited'.
RPG Group took over the company in 1985 from EMI; at the time when the company’s financial health was poor. Over next few years, RPG Group nursed back the company to its strong footing.
The name of the company was then changed from "The Gramophone Company of India" to ‘Saregama India Limited' on November 3, 2000. The name "Saregama" refers to the first four notes of the Indian musical scale.
In 2005, the remaining EMI stake was sold off to the parent company.
For first 100 years, the company retailed its products (vinyls, casettes, CDs) under the brand name HMV, and was synonymous with film music in India. From 2000 onwards, it started retailing its products under brand name Saregama.
Saregama’s recording studio, called Dum Dum studio, was built in 1928 in Calcutta. It is one of the oldest studios in Southeast Asia. Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore had recorded his songs and poems in his own voice at this studio. Rebel poet Kazi Nazrul Islam's voice was also recorded here.
This studio also housed sprawling manufacturing facilities for production of Gramophone Records and thereafter Music Cassettes. With advent of digital formats, the physical formats progressively went out of consumers patronage and consequently, these manufacturing facilities were shut down.
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Wikipedia