Lal Chand Bisu, Co-founder & CEO of Kuku, on building a mobile-first storytelling platform that blends storytelling, technology & user insights and how AWS powers its scale.
India’s micro-drama industry is witnessing explosive growth, transitioning from an experimental format to a significant digital entertainment category in just a few years. Designed as short, episodic vertical videos for mobile consumption, these stories combine brevity with depth, delivering engaging narratives in quick bursts that resonate strongly with audiences. Its adoption has been especially significant in Tier 2 and Tier 3 markets (as well as Tier 1 markets), supported by favorable consumer behavior trends and increasing digital penetration.
The “Crafting Bharat – Season 3” presented by AWS Startups, an initiative by NewsReach and production partner – HT Smartcast, explores the founders’ resilience, agility and passion to build a super startup and inspire the next wave of entrepreneurs. This series is hosted by Gautam Srinivasan, famed for hosting a diverse range of TV and digital programs, currently consulting editor at CNBC (India), CNN-News18, Forbes India, and The Economic Times.
In this episode, we highlight Lal Chand Bisu, Co-founder & CEO of Kuku, on building a mobile-first storytelling platform that blends storytelling, technology & user insights. With AI driving production and AWS enabling scale, the company is building the foundation for the future of global storytelling. Discover the inspiring where we deconstruct the blueprint of growth for India’s super startups through this series.
Edited Excerpts:
How did you arrive at product market fit for long-form serialized content in 2020? What gave you the confidence that this was the right bet for Bharat, given its unique audio consumption patterns compared to the West?
Product market fit is a very subjective concept. There is no fixed definition or checklist that tells you when you have achieved it and are ready to scale. It is like storytelling. Any story can work, just like any movie can become a hit, but there is no guaranteed formula behind it. In our case, we relied heavily on user feedback. Ultimately, you only know something works when users consume it and derive value from it. That is when you can say you have built something meaningful. When we asked users if they would pay, 70 to 80 percent answered yes. Initially, we were skeptical because people often say yes in conversations but may not follow through. However, our instinct told us that users were genuinely finding value in the product. Despite early doubts about whether users would pay for original content, the data proved otherwise. Within three months, 6 to 7 out of every 100 users were paying, compared to a global average of 2 to 3 percent. This gave us strong confidence that we were on the right track, and as we improved our content library and product experience, the business continued to grow.
Who are your biggest content revenue drivers today?
Our journey began with building mobile-first premium content, starting on the audio side with Kuku FM, where we introduced high-quality premium audio content. We later expanded into video by launching mobile-first premium content in a vertical format. Traditionally, movies have always been consumed horizontally, whether in theaters, on desktops, or on laptops. We reimagined this by creating vertical storytelling through micro-dramas. These micro-dramas are essentially full-length stories of 90 to 120 minutes, delivered in short episodes of around two minutes each. We launched this format in 2024.
Today, both Kuku FM and Kuku TV are strong players in their respective categories. However, in terms of revenue contribution, Kuku TV has grown larger than audio, as video content has a wider market and stronger user demand compared to audio.
How are you using Gen AI to increase content production volumes? How is AWS supporting you in this journey?
As a content company, AI is deeply integrated into what we do. Today, a significant portion of content production is powered by AI. At a high level, I would say around 60% – 70% of the content creation process involves AI in some form.
Our approach is very structured. We use AI across multiple stages of content creation. On the production side, AI use is still evolving. Currently, around 10% – 15% of production involves AI, such as using green screens and generating complex backgrounds that would otherwise require expensive sets. However, this is expected to grow as the technology matures. From an infrastructure perspective, AWS plays a crucial role. We already use AWS for cloud and AI capabilities, and we are now moving towards building our own in-house models. AWS enables us to train these models at scale and manage large volumes of data efficiently.
Looking ahead, we envision scaling from producing around 100 micro-dramas per month today to thousands every month with high quality. With continuous improvements in AI and access to our own data, AWS can be a strong partner in helping us build and scale this capability.
Stay tuned to Crafting Bharat – Season 3 as we bring you these inspiring entrepreneurs for insightful and candid discussions with Gautam Srinivasan.
Quote: “Our approach is simple. Keep teams lean, stay focused, and maximize output with higher efficiency.”
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@CraftingBharat
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/craftingbharatofficial/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/craftingbharat/
