Viacom18 on Thursday said it has appointed Jyoti Deshpande as CEO with immediate effect. She is already serving on the boards of Network18 and investee companies Balaji Telefilms and Saavn Media.

“In her new assignment, Jyoti will help bring synergies across all of Reliance’s media interests and investments and further equip the company to drive significant growth opportunities as the industry embraces digital transformation,” it said in a statement.

Deshpande, who is an industry veteran with over 27 years of experience in the media and entertainment sector, joined Reliance Industries in 2018 as President – Media Platform & Content. Prior to Reliance Industries, she was MD and CEO at Eros International.

In the past three years, she focused on establishing Jio Studios as a key player in the media value chain, the statement added.

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Adil Zainulbhai, Chairman, Network18, said, “Viacom18 is poised to grow as a truly integrated media company across broadcast, OTT and content studio business spanning general entertainment, movies and sports across languages. Given Jyoti’s rich experience in the media sector around content, distribution and monetisation across traditional and emerging platforms, we believe she is best placed to lead the company and its operations.”

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