MAM
Amit Achupulaya promoted as manager production services sports at JioStar
MUMBAI: Amit Achupulaya, one of Indian television’s most battle-hardened broadcast technicians, has taken charge as manager, production services sports at JioStar, marking another high-profile move in the fast-consolidating sports media ecosystem.
Achupulaya brings with him more than two decades of experience across live sports, news and large-scale broadcast operations. Best known for his long stint at CNBC-TV18, where he rose from video editor in 2000 to chief video editor by 2007, he spent nearly 12 years running post-production across CNBC-TV18 and Awaaz-TV18, overseeing daily output at scale and under relentless deadline pressure.
In recent years, he has been at the sharp end of live sport. He worked as an EVS operator on Sony Sports’ Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 broadcast, handled Libero and Piero systems for Star Sports’ Indian Super League across multiple seasons with Deltatre, and served as match VT editor during the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2021 in the UAE. His freelance portfolio also includes IPL live shows for Mumbai Indians across television, YouTube and Facebook.
Prior to getting the manager production services sports role at JioStar, Achupulaya was designated as manager and chief video editor at Viacom Sports18, where he played a key role in shaping live sports production workflows, graphics integration and editorial packaging for marquee properties.
Fluent across EVS, Piero, Libero and advanced video editing systems, Achupulaya is widely regarded as a rare all-rounder with deep, end-to-end understanding of how modern broadcast and digital sports platforms are built, stressed and delivered.
At JioStar, he will be responsible for strengthening production services across sports properties at a time when rights, technology and viewer expectations are colliding at speed.
From newsroom tape decks to Olympic control rooms, Achupulaya has seen it all. Now, at Jiostar, he is back where the action is loudest, fastest and unforgiving, and that is exactly where he does his best work.
AD Agencies
Abhay Duggal joins JioStar as director of Hindi GEC ad sales
The streaming giant brings in a seasoned revenue hand as the battle for Hindi television advertising heats up
MUMBAI: Abhay Duggal has a new desk, and JioStar has a new weapon. The media and entertainment veteran has joined JioStar as director of entertainment ad sales for Hindi general entertainment channels, adding 17 years of hard-won revenue experience to one of India’s most powerful broadcasting operations.
Duggal is no stranger to big portfolios or bruising markets. Before joining JioStar, he spent a brief stint at Republic World as deputy general manager and north regional head for ad sales. Before that, he put in three years at Enterr10 Television, where he ran the north region for Dangal TV and Dangal 2, two of India’s leading free-to-air Hindi channels. The north alone accounted for more than 50 per cent of total channel revenue on his watch, a number that tends to get attention in any sales meeting.
His longest stint was at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where he spent over six years rising to associate director of sales. There he commanded the Hindi movies cluster across seven channels, owned more than half of north India’s revenue across flagship properties including Zee TV and &TV, and closed marquee sponsorships across the Indian Premier League, Zee Rishtey Awards and Dance India Dance. He also handled monetisation for the English movies and entertainment cluster and the global news channel WION, a portfolio that would stretch most sales teams twice his size.
Earlier in his career Duggal closed what was then a Rs 3 crore single deal at Reliance Broadcast Network, one of the largest in Indian radio at the time, before that he helped launch and monetise JAINHITS, India’s first HITS-based cable and satellite platform.
His edge, by his own account, lies in marrying data and instinct: translating audience trends, inventory signals and client demands into long-term partnerships built on cost-per-rating-point discipline rather than short-term deal chasing. In a media landscape being reshaped by streaming, fragmented attention and AI-driven advertising, that kind of rigour is increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.
JioStar, which blends the scale of Reliance’s Jio platform with the content firepower of Star, is doubling down on its advertising business at precisely the moment the Hindi GEC market is getting more competitive. Bringing in someone who has spent nearly two decades doing exactly this, across some of India’s most watched channels, is a pointed statement of intent. Duggal has spent his career turning audiences into revenue. JioStar is clearly betting he can do it again, and bigger.
