News Broadcasting
Time Warner inducts COO Bewkes onto board
MUMBAI: Time Warner president and COO Jeff Bewkes has been elected to the company’s board of directors. Motorola chairman and CEO Edward J. Zander has also been elected.
Speculation doing the rounds is that Bewkes is in line to succeed Dick Parsons as chairman and CEO.
“Jeff Bewkes has been a highly effective partner as we’ve worked together in turning Time Warner around and setting it firmly on a path of sustainable growth,” Parsons said.
“As COO, Jeff’s been a superb leader of our businesses, driving the AOL transition, encouraging superior performance across the company, and working to realize our full potential, especially in the advancement of our digital capabilities. His intimate knowledge of our company and industry, along with his intelligence, energy and character, will make him a valuable addition to our Board.”
Time Warner’s Board now has 14 members including Bewkes and Zanders. Six of the members joined the Board since January 2004. The other members of Time Warner’s Board are Parsons, James L.
Barksdale, Stephen F. Bollenbach, Frank J. Caufield, Robert C. Clark, Mathias Dopfner, Jessica P. Einhorn, Reuben Mark, Michael A. Miles, Kenneth J. Novack, Francis T. Vincent, Jr. and Deborah C. Wright.
News Broadcasting
Senior media executive Madhu Soman exits Zee Media
Former Reuters and Bloomberg leader says he leaves with “no regrets” after brief stint at WION and Zee Business
NOIDA: Madhu Soman, a veteran of global newsrooms and media sales floors, has stepped away from Zee Media Corporation after a short stint steering business strategy for WION and Zee Business.
In a reflective LinkedIn note marking his departure, Soman said his time within the network’s corridors was always likely to be brief. “Some chapters close faster than expected,” he wrote, signalling the end of a nearly two-year spell in which he oversaw both editorial partnerships and commercial strategy.
Soman joined Zee Media in 2022 after more than a decade abroad with Reuters and Bloomberg, returning to India to take on the role of chief business officer for WION and Zee Business. His mandate was ambitious: bridge the newsroom and the revenue desk while expanding digital and broadcast reach.
During the stint, Zee Business reached break-even for the first time since its launch in 2005, while WION refreshed programming and strengthened its digital footprint across platforms such as YouTube and Facebook.
But Soman suggested the cultural fit proved uneasy. Describing himself as a “cultural misfit”, he hinted at deeper tensions between editorial instincts shaped in global newsrooms and the realities of India’s television news ecosystem.
Before joining Zee, Soman spent more than seven years at Bloomberg in Hong Kong as head of broadcast sales for Asia-Pacific, expanding the company’s news syndication business across several markets. Earlier, he held senior editorial roles at Reuters, overseeing online strategy in India and managing Reuters Video Services from London.
His career began in television and wire reporting, including a stint with ANI during the 1999 Kargil conflict, before moving into digital publishing as India’s internet media landscape took shape.
Now, after nearly three decades in broadcast and digital media, Soman is leaving Delhi NCR and returning to his hometown, Trivandrum.
Exhausted, he admits. But unbowed. And with one quiet line that sums up the journey: he didn’t sell his soul — because some things, after all, are not for sale.
