News18 Kannada, the most trusted news channel in Karnataka, announced the appointment of Siddu Kaloji and Swaroop Murgod. Siddu joins the channel as Editor (News and Programming) and Swaroop as Head of Production. The channel also announced the elevation of Vijayalakshmi Shibarur and Lakshmana Hoogar to the core leadership team.
Commenting on the appointments, Karthik Subbaraman, Executive Editor (Special Projects), Network 18, said, “Siddu and Swaroop are among the finest talents in journalism in Karnataka. They bring innovation, creativity and speed, attributes which will help take what is the state’s most credible news channel to a wider audience. Vijayalakhsmi Shibarur, who ranks among the best investigative journalists in the country, is also moving into a frontline role as part of the core leadership team of News18 Kannada. And so is Lakshmana Hoogar, a fearless anchor who heads political coverage. I wish all of them the best for their new roles and upcoming challenges.”
All input, output and programming functions at the channel will now report to Siddu. He has over two decades of experience in news television. He has worked for News18 Kannada in its former avatar as ETV News Kannada and Zee News.
Swaroop is a Network18 veteran, having had a stint at what CNN News18 in Delhi. In a career of 22 years so far, he has worked at Aaj Tak, Star News, News9, ESPN Cricinfo, NDTV and Asianet.
Category: People
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News18 Kannada strengthens its core team with new appointments
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Raj Nayak, Janak Sarda to be felicitated by International Advertising Association
MUMBAI: At the annual International Advertising Association (IAA) Inspire awards to be held at Bucharest on 2 October 2018 with advertising and marketing leaders from all over the world in attendance, Viacom18 COO Raj Nayak and past president IAA India Chapter will be felicitated with the prestigious “Champion Award”. Nayak will be recognized for his excellence in leadership, vision and distinguished services of leaders in the IAA and his contributions to advancing the IAA and communications in the worldwide marketing communications industry.
The IAA Inspire award will also recognize Deshdhoot Group of Publications joint managing director Janak Sarda with the Young Leader Award for excellence in contributing leadership and services in the IAA Young Professionals arena and creating dynamics in marketing communications.
Speaking about the felicitation of Raj Nayak, IAA India Chapter president, Ramesh Narayan said, “I am really overjoyed to announce this news. Having worked closely in the IAA with Raj Nayak I have been a witness to his dynamism, his receptivity to ideas, and his capacity to contribute to anything that furthers the cause of marketing communications in India. He drove and launched the prestigious IAA “Lighting a Billion Lives Campaign” which set the tone to provide solar lighting in millions of dark homes across the country. He also played a major role in the rolling out and nurturing the prestigious IAA leadership Awards for marketing and business excellence which has grown enormously over the last six years. This award is an honor not just for Raj but also for the entire communications industry in the country.”
He further added, “Janak Sarda has played a solid role in spreading the message of marketing and communications to the younger generation of professionals which he himself represents so well. His contribution is actually a sign of the larger role one can expect from him in the years to come. I wish him well.” -
Discovery India head Karan Bajaj calls it a day
MUMBAI: There’s change coming at the top at Discovery India. India head Karan Bajaj has decided to move on to pursue his own entrepreneurial venture.
This was disclosed to Discovery India staff by president and CEO Discovery Networks International JB Perrette earlier in memo today. JB as he is known to all in the industry elaborated that Karan will continue to stay in his role for the next few months until a replacement is found.
“It will be business as usual. While our leader in India will change, our ambition and belief in you as a team remains unchanged…we want to grow and innovate our business in this big and dynamic market,” says Perrette in the note.
Perrette is full of praise for Karan in the memo. Says he: “Karan has embodied many of our company’s guiding principles – “purposeful” as he passionately lead a bold swing to create a new type of purpose driven GE channel in India with Jeet; a creative dreamer who believed we could invest in a great team who could take a small kids channel from the lowest rankings to being a top three kids network; consumer obsessed by launching new digital products that focused on making our brands and content more relevant to India’s exploding digital consumers; and quick and agile with a great sense of urgency and drive to reinvent and expand our business. These leadership are ones we will also look for in the next leader of our team and business in India as they remain critical for our future.”
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IBF rejigs board; appoints VPs to steer key objectives
MUMBAI: The board of directors of the Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF) has unanimously appointed Siddharth Jain, Rajat Sharma, Sudhanshu Vats and K Madhavan as the vice-presidents to broadbase and liaise with the government and other stakeholders for the sectoral growth.
Turner International India Pvt Ltd South Asia SVP and MD Siddharth Jain will be the VP for distribution. India TV chairman and editor-in-chief Rajat Sharma shall oversee government affairs in his role as the VP of the foundation. Viacom18 group CEO Sudhanshu Vats would be VP—audience measurement and Asianet communications MD K Madhavan will be spearheading the regional affairs portfolio.
India Today Group chairman and editor-in-chief Aroon Purie shall continue as the treasurer of the foundation till the next AGM.
In the 19th annual general meeting of IBF held on 31 August 2018, the members unanimously elected Prasar Bharati CEO Shashi S Vempati to the board of directors of IBF. His inclusion in the board will strengthen the foundation technologically considering his prior experience in the IT sector.
With the inclusion of ABP News Networks COO Avinash Pandey, The Walt Disney Co- South Asia EVP and MD Mahesh Samat, Malayalam Communications Ltd MD and editor-in-chief John Brittas as co-opted directors on the board of the foundation, IBF is geared up to meet the sectoral challenges.
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Essel’s Subhash Chandra on Zee, OTT giants & the Jio juggernaut
MUMBAI: Zee Entertainment Enterprises (Zee) has withheld challenges from international broadcasters to acquire a place as one of the top media companies in India. While several players with deep pockets are investing a high amount in content, Essel Group chairman Subhash Chandra, with 26 years of experience, says only money cannot buy the best content.
Speaking to The Hindu, the media veteran said telecom, voice, data, and video all are merging into one single pipe. Moreover, Reliance Jio’s low pricing has made the delivery pipe cheap and affordable forcing other telecom players to do the same. This change will help content companies.
“Even the Amazons, Googles and YouTubes of the world now call themselves media companies instead of tech companies. So, thanks to Jio, this process, which could have taken 5-10 years, has accelerated in India,” he added.
However, he also pointed out Jio’s different nature of the business. The company tends more towards monopoly rather than being a part of the industry. This trend could catalyse the merger of content players with pipe and data, as it happened in America and Europe.
Hailing content as the prime factor, he also said creativity comes above money. A big budget show cannot assure good ratings always. Despite expensive deals, he is sceptical of Jio’s ability to scale.
“We have competed with all media companies. Today, NewsCorp is in India through Star. Time Warner was here, Viacom came, Sony is here, Discovery is here. So, of the top eight global media firms, five are here and we have competed with all. In 2007, a management consulting firm said India would be left with just three players and Zee is the weakest link that will either close or get sold. That didn’t happen,” he said.
Amazon Prime and Netflix are also trying to acquire a stronger foothold in the Indian market given the high potential of the digital content business. Chandra said that Amazon being largely an e-commerce player tries to lure customers for shopping through content. Zee also shares content with the company. But as Netflix is a pure content play, it won’t share content with the streaming giant. The OTT platform’s situation is also different in the country due to its high pricing.
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Ex Times Now marketing head Sujeet Mishra joins Zee Media
MUMBAI: Sujeet Mishra, Times Now’s former marketing head has joined Zee Media. Confirming the news to Indiantelevision.com, Mishra said that his last day in Times Now was on 5 September 2018.
Having joined Times Now in December last year, Mishra was leading the brand’s strategic planning and communication, including new brand initiatives, consumer research, market development across ATL, BTL and digital platforms.
With over 13 years of experience in marketing and brand communications, Mishra had joined Times Now after a successful stint at ABP News Network where he was overseeing four news brands, managed IP events and played a pivotal role in the brand transition of the channel from Star News to ABP News.
Prior to joining ABP News Network in 2006, Mishra was working with Dainik Jagran and ETV Network. Mishra is an alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad’s marketing executive development program.
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Zeel appoints Rohit Gupta as CFO
MUMBAI: Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL) has announced the appointment of Rohit Gupta as the CFO and will report to Zeel MD and CEO Punit Goenka.
In his new role, Gupta will be spearheading the fiscal and financial management aspect of the company. He will also be responsible for the development of operational and financial strategy and monitoring of control systems designed to preserve the company assets.
Gupta comes with a rich experience of 25 years in domestic and international markets in various aspects of business including managing operations, shareholder and investor expectations, risk management, business planning, process implementation, fiduciary governance, accounting, finance, taxation, revenue management, treasury, forex, fraud management and cost minimization, and financial management. Having a strong record of turning around businesses, he has successfully led the business restructuring and realignment exercises to enhance profitability and market capitalisation.
Prior to joining ZEEL, Gupta was associated with the Chaudhary Group where he was responsible for the roll-out of 5G ready telecom network in Nepal. Previously, he has also worked with leading corporations like the DCM Shriram group, Hero Group, Hutchinson Max, British Telecom, Bharti Airtel, Virgin Mobile, NIIT and Brightstar India.
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NP Singh elected new IBF president
MUMBAI: At the 19th annual general meeting(AGM) of Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF), Sony Pictures Networks India CEO and MD NP Singh was elected as the new president of the foundation. Singh will succeed Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd ( ZEEL) MD Punit Goenka who held the position for two years.
Earlier Goenka took over the responsibility from Star India chairman and CEO Uday Shankar in 2016. Prasar Bharati CEO Shashi Shekhar Vempati has been elected as the new director of IBF board.
“I am elated to lead IBF at a crucial juncture and will put my best efforts to make the sector invigorating. A strong media and broadcast sector will not only serve as the conscience-keeper of the nation but will educate, entertain and acclimatise the masses. My key objective would be to ensure the larger good of the sector in keeping with the regulatory practices,” Singh commented on his election.
“Singh has always been a supportive colleague on the Board and his broad insight and acumen will help us deal with the challenges that the sector is facing today,” outgoing president Goenka said.
Along with India TV founder and chairman Rajat Sharma, Star India MD South K Madhavan, and Viacom18 MD Sudhanshu Vats, Singh was holding the office of vice president for last two years. The media veteran has rich experience of more than 30 years. He started his stint in Sony Entertainment back in 1999 as chief financial officer. The Delhi University alumni also studied in Institute of Cost Accountants of India.
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Aparna Bhosle appointed Zee TV business head, Shaurya Mehta to lead premium cluster
MUMBAI: Aparna Bhosle will lead Zee Entertainment’s flagship channel ZEE TV as its business head. Bhosle will continue to lead the FTA GECs and will report to ZEEL domestic broadcast business CEO Punit Misra.
The Premium Cluster will now be led by Shaurya Mehta, in addition to his current role as the chief operating officer, Living Entertainment. He too will also to Misra.
Bhosle has been with ZEEL for more than six years. She joined the company in 2012 as the business head of ZeeQ and Zee Anmol. In 2017, she was elevated as business cluster head of premium & FTA GECs.
Before joining ZEEL, Bhosle worked with Astro Malaysia as Food Food head – programming, production and broadcast operations for more than two years.
She also had a stint with The Walt Disney Company as director – programming, production and broadcast operations of Hungama TV/Disney Channel/Disney XD. Bhosle has also worked with companies like UTV, Wisden India, Diageo and Reckitt & Colman.
Shaurya Mehta started his career in 2003 as systems associate at GE healthcare. After serving the company for about two years, he joined Deloitte Consulting as the senior consultant. In 2012, he was the co-founder and COO of Ekstop.com and after three years, in 2015, he was the head of Ecommerce at Godrej. Last year, Mehta was appointed as the Essel Group’s lifestyle channel-Living Foodz COO and now, in addition to his current role, he will also look after the premium cluster that Bhosle used to head.
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Paul Buccieri named as president of A+E Networks Group
MUMBAI: According to reports, Hearst and The Walt Disney Company have announced that Paul Buccieri has been named as president of A+E Networks Group and will report to the network’s board of directors.
In his previous role, Buccieri was responsible for all aspects of A+E Studios and the A+E Networks brand portfolio. During his tenure, he bolstered the strength of the A+E Networks Portfolio Group, entrenching both A+E and History as top 10 networks, and charted a new strategic course for Lifetime.
The announcement was made by Hearst president and CEO Steven R Swartzand and Disney Media Networks co-chair and president of Disney|ABC Television Ben Sherwood.
In a joint statement, Swartz and Sherwood said, “Paul’s successful track record running A+E Studios and overseeing programming at the portfolio of brands, combined with his experience in worldwide production, distribution, syndication and digital, will further propel A+E Networks’ momentum. He’s a proven leader, strong collaborator and skilled programmer with an eye for identifying trends in the very competitive content marketplace. As we make this announcement, we also thank A+E Acting Chairman Abbe Raven for her leadership during the transition and her assistance in identifying Paul as the network’s next leader. Abbe will remain in her role at least through year-end.”
Buccieri added, “I want to sincerely thank our board members at Disney and Hearst for offering me this exceptional opportunity to lead A+E Networks during this transformative time in media. I could not be prouder of A+E’s powerful brands, strong partnerships and, most importantly, the talented people I get to work with every day. We look forward to expanding on our solid foundation of creativity.”
Buccieri joined A+E Networks in 2015 as president, A&E and History, overseeing all content creation, programming, brand development and marketing for A&E and History, and affiliated brands.
Previously, Buccieri served as chairman, ITV Studios US Group and ITV Studios Global Entertainment for ITV. He also led ITV’s international television distribution and consumer products business. Prior to joining ITV, Buccieri was president of programming, production and development at Fox Twentieth Television.