MUMBAI: In a bid to step up on international distribution of movies and the home entertainment space, PVR Cinemas has appointed ex-Studio 18 senior vice president international business Ashoka Holla as chief operating officer (COO) of its Film Cell division.

The Film Cell houses the international distribution, home entertainment and content creation portfolios, which will now be handled by Holla. At the time of filing this report, Holla and PVR managing director Ajay Bijli were unavailable for comment.

PVR Cinemas COO (West) Ashish Saxena has been recently upped as PVR Film Cell CEO.

According to sources, PVR Cinemas is firming up plans to enter into the home entertainment market and international distribution of films. Until now PVR has distributed movies like Don, Omkara, Honeymoon Travels Pvt Ltd and Bheja Fry in select Indian territories.

The titles for home video will mostly comprise independent Hollywood movies. The company purchases the entire suite of distribution rights including the theatrical, satellite/television and DVD rights for international films on an all India basis.

Apart from this, PVR has also entered into a co-production deal with Aamir Khan Productions for two movies namely Taare Zameen Par and Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na. The former is now in its post production stages and is likely to release towards the end of this year or early next year. The home video rights of these two movies will be under the PVR home entertainment label.

PVR Cinemas recently underwent a corporate identity change and forayed into the food courts business starting with the Sahara Mall in Gurgaon.