Indian cinemas will admit four billion cinema-goers a year by 2011 according to a new report, Cinemagoing India, from analysts Dodona Research. Already half of all cinema visits worldwide are made in the country. A strong economy, retail boom and rising middle class disposable incomes will translate into higher film industry revenues, with box office forecast to grow by 30% over the next five years.

Although outsiders tend to be transfixed by the 700 movies a year made in the country -not only by the so-called Bollywood Hindi film business around Mumbai but also in other regional centres - big investments are also being made in the downstream exhibition business. Most Indian cinemas are aging single screen traditional cinemas, but two big trends are revolutionising the Indian cinema experience.

Ten years since the country s first one opened, multiplexes are at last taking off. Although multiplexes today account for just 4% of India s cinema screens, they can take 40% of the box office for some films due to their much higher ticket prices. As a consequence six companies: Adlabs, PVR Cinemas, INOX Leisure, E-City Ventures, Shringar Cinemas and Cinemax Cinemas, have built war chests to fund ambitious nationwide multiplex circuits and plan to open 1,500 screens between them.

Outside the major cities a number of companies are pursuing a novel digital cinema business model. Ignoring the Hollywood studio-inspired DCI 2K/4K standard and using instead lower resolution 1.3K or HD projectors, these companies are acquiring and converting old single screen venues to create sizeable networks of digital screens. Compared to the often run down and antiquated 35 mm projection equipment and screens which have been replaced, the new digital systems offer much better picture and sound quality, while the ability to play digital files instead of expensive 35 mm prints means the cinemas get copies of hit movies on release instead of weeks or months later.

The biggest player in this sector, UFO Moviez, currently operates 918 screens, followed by Pyramid Saimira with 371 and E-City Digital with 90. By 2011, these three companies will expand their networks to cover more than 5,000 screens.

Report author, Katharine Wright, commented, "Although there are still problems to be surmounted such as high entertainment taxes and piracy, India s exhibitors are showing ambitions on a grand scale. On the basis of current plans, in 2011 half of all the screens in the country will have been built or re-equipped within the past five years. Even at its height, the European and North American multiplex boom did not match this scale of investment."