iWorld
Saugato Bhowmik may replace Gandhi as Viacom18 Digital COO
MUMBAI: Soon after the news of Gaurav Gandhi leaving Viacom18 was announced last week, speculation was rife about who would take the hot seat to lead the company’s digital arm Viacom18 Digital Ventures, under which Voot operates.
A source close to the development has told Indiatelevision.com that Saugato Bhowmik is the top choice among those gunning for the spot of COO.
Although the company is still said to be considering various profiles, the management seems to have narrowed down its choice to Bhowmik.
Bhowmik currently serves as the executive vice president and business head of consumer products and integrated network solutions at Viacom18 leading two key businesses, which are tasked to build the network’s brands outside the broadcast and movie studio space.
He joined Viacom18 in 2013 and has a rich experience and understanding of consumer behaviour and insights. Bhowmik began his career at Dabur India as the area sales manager in 2002 and moved to Hindustan Unilever in 2004 where he refined his consumer-marketing skills in strategic brand management roles for key brands for India as well as globally.
Gandhi quit Viacom18 after eight years. Launched in 2016, Voot is Viacom’s digital service that offers content in multiple languages, including English, Hindi, Tamil, Kannada and Bengali.
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iWorld
Akhil Gupta retires as Bharti Enterprises vice chairman after three decades
The man who outsourced Airtel’s network and built Indus Towers leaves behind a telecom industry transformed
NEW DELHI: He was not the most visible face of Bharti. He was, by most accounts, the most consequential one. Akhil Gupta, known within the group simply as AKG, has retired as vice chairman of Bharti Enterprises with effect from March 31st, 2026, closing a chapter that stretched across more than three decades and reshaped Indian telecoms in ways still felt today.
Gupta was there at the beginning, part of the core leadership team that steered Bharti Airtel from a scrappy domestic operator into one of the world’s largest telecom and digital services companies. But it is two decisions in particular that cement his legacy. The first was persuading the industry that a telecom company need not own its own network. His outsourcing partnerships with IBM and Ericsson, considered eccentric at the time, stripped out capital costs and sharpened Airtel’s competitive edge. The model was subsequently copied across the global industry. The second was the creation of Indus Towers, now one of the largest tower companies in the world.
Both initiatives were studied as case material at Harvard Business School, where Gupta himself had studied. A chartered accountant by training and a dealmaker by instinct, he accumulated industry accolades across his career without ever particularly courting the limelight.
Bharti Enterprises, announcing the retirement on LinkedIn, credited Gupta with building the foundation of the group’s success and driving innovation, partnerships and long-term value creation.
The tributes are deserved. Gupta did not just help build Airtel. In many respects, he helped invent the playbook that modern telecoms runs on.
