Gaana appoints Shabnam Majumdar as director of partnerships and alliances

MUMBAI: Gaana has appointed Shabnam Majumdar as director of partnerships and alliances. The move brings an experienced business development and strategic partnerships executive on board as the music streaming platform looks to deepen collaborations and strengthen its commercial ecosystem.

Majumdar joins Gaana after spending more than seven years at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where she most recently served as associate director, strategic partnerships, digital for ZEE5. During her tenure, she played a key role in building subscription-led partnerships with telecom operators, DTH providers and digital platforms, helping expand the OTT service’s distribution footprint.

Her responsibilities included identifying new business opportunities, creating partnership strategies, negotiating commercial agreements and leading execution from deal signing through to launch. She also spearheaded business plans aimed at growing subscription revenues through B2B partnerships.

Among her notable achievements at ZEE5 was scaling partnerships with companies including Vi, Bharti Airtel, Dish TV and Paytm, contributing to a reported 15 per cent year-on-year revenue growth. She also negotiated improved subscription economics that increased average revenue per user by around 20 to 25 per cent and helped reduce the deal-to-revenue cycle by half through closer collaboration with product, technology and marketing teams.

Before joining ZEE5, Majumdar briefly served as business head for north and east at Rhiti Sports Management. In that role, she managed the endorsement portfolio of MS Dhoni, expanded sponsorship opportunities across major sporting properties and led the 2019 IPL Trophy Tour campaign across four Indian cities.

Her earlier stint at BIG FM saw her drive growth in advertising and on-ground activation revenues through partnerships with leading consumer brands across sectors including automotive and consumer electronics.

Majumdar also held the position of general manager, strategic sales at G4S, where she focused on enterprise sales, long-term client partnerships and integrated security solutions.

She spent more than seven years at Vodafone as strategic account manager for Vodafone Global Enterprise. There, she worked across enterprise mobility, fixed-line and emerging telecom solutions, delivering sustained B2B revenue growth and developing innovative offerings, including IoT-enabled connected coolers for Coca-Cola to improve sales tracking and customer engagement.

With experience spanning telecom, media, sports, radio and digital entertainment, Majumdar brings a broad partnership playbook to Gaana. Her appointment signals the company’s intent to strike the right chord with strategic alliances as competition in India’s digital audio and entertainment market continues to intensify.