This is Øya International

Øya International is a business-to-business program aimed at professional stakeholders working with Norwegian music export. The program takes place during the Øya Festival, and is executed by Music Norway and the festival, with support from the Royal Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Øya International offers a unique opportunity to build relations with international companies in the music business through speed meeting sessions and other networking activities.

Read more: Q&A with the people behind Øya International

This year 105 international industry and press delegates links up with 52 local delegates representing Norwegian music companies. The international delegates are handpicked and represents markets such as: UK, US, Germany, China, Mexico, India, Italy, Croatia, Denmark, Sweden and Polen.

Insiders Guide: India

On the 8th of August three delegates from India will take us on a deep dive into the Indian music market.

Read more: Q&A with Shukla, Shankar and Gurbaxani

– India is now ranked as the 15th largest music market, but it is expected to rank in the top 10 by 2022. The market experienced a growth in income from recorded music of a staggering 24,5% in 2018 according to IFPI´s Global Music Report 2019. To comparison the world market as a whole experienced a groth of 9,7%. The Indian population consumes more of its music through legal sources and platforms, and its growing middle class has made an influx on the total income. This makes it important for the Norwegian music industry to orient it self towards the Indian music market, states Kathrine Synnes Finnskog, Managing Director of Music Norway.

– We are grateful for the strong Indian presence at this edition of Øya International, and we are looking forward to their contributions to the Insiders Guide to India highlighting the challenges and possibilities in the market. This is also a handy preparation to our Trade Mission to India later in August by building market competence and network before we leave. Our goal is to open up the doors to new possibilities in a new market in conjunction with the harder competition in the traditional markets such as US, UK and Germany. We hope this leads to new partnerships and accelerates targeted ventures in the market, Finnskog finishes.

The Indian delegates:

Roochay Shukla is marketing manager for Outdustry´s India Office. He has previous experience from heading the marketing department of Sony Music India. Outdustry´s clients includes Beggars Group, Merlin, Spotify, PRS, AWAL, Warner, and Universal. They work with artist such as Dua Lipa, Ellie Goulding, Major Lazer, Lauv, Diplo, and Zedd.

Akhila Shankar is associate director for brands and communication at JioSaavn, Indias largest music streaming platform.

Amit Gurbaxani is a journalist and writes for India Today, Scroll and First Post. He founded and is the current chief editor for the Daily Pao an online food and culture platform that publishes a daily gig guide for Mumbai.