MUMBAI: Co-productions seems to be the way forward in the Indian film industry. Now, Indian music conglomerate T-Series and motion picture house Percept Picture Company have inked a five film co-production deal.

The move comes at a time when corporate giants are aggressively moving forward in the growing filmed entertainment space, which was once upon a time dominated by individual producers.

The five film deal between T-Series and Percept Picture Company will be a 50:50 joint venture and the films will be made over a period of two years.

Confirming the development to Businessofcinema.com a senior official at T-Series says, “We have signed a deal with Percept for five films, which will start with Nagesh Kukunoor’s two films Aashayein and Tasveer. Aashayein stars John Abraham, whereas Tasveer stars Akshay Kumar. The other three projects are still under finalisation.”

Percept Picture Company CEO Preet Bedi said, “There are several areas of synergy between the two companies and both, T-Series and PPC are keen to take this partnership into other areas such as music videos and events etc.”

The announcement is expected to be made at a press conference next week.

T-Series’ currently has three films in its kitty. The first is Priyadarshan’s Bhool Bhulaiya starring Akshay Kumar, Vidya Balan, Shiney Ahuja, Amisha Patel, Paresh Rawal, Rajpal Yadav, Vineet, Asrani, Vikram Gokhale and Manoj Joshi. Second is Ram Gopal Verma’s Darling starring Fardeen Khan, Bipasha Basu and Esha Deol; whereas the third one is E Niwas‘ My Name is Anthony Gonsalves starring Nikhil Dwivedi, Amrita Rao, Anupam Kher and Saurabh Shukla.

This step by T-Series’ is a move towards consolidating its leadership position in the market after the recent onslaught of corporate players like Eros International, which has announced a mammoth slate of 50 films in FY08 – 09. On the other hand, Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani (R-ADAG) owned Reliance Entertainment’s film production arm BIG Motion Picture has also announced its entry into the space and has inked a film deal with Farhan Akhtar. Pritish Nandy Communications has inked a five film deal worth $25 million with Florida based Motion Pixel Corporation for animation films. Corporates like Viacom and Television 18’s joint venture The Indian Film Company and UTV Motion Pictures has also announced big plans for movies.

Stay tuned to this space for more…