Tony D'silva to spearhead Hinduja Group's media business

D'silva takes over from Ravi Mansukhani, who has decided to move on. The company has earmarked Rs 300 crore for restructuring its media business

BestMediaInfo Bureau / Mumbai / February 3, 2014

Hinduja Ventures Limited (HVL) is restructuring its media vertical in order to enhance synergy across its various media initiatives. It has earmarked an investment of Rs 300 crore for the media business.

Ravi Mansukhani, Managing Director of HVL's flagship cable company, IndusInd Media & Communications Ltd (IMCL), has expressed his desire to relinquish his services. The board has accepted his request. To continue the emphasis on taking advantage of opportunities presented by digitisation in the cable business, the company has appointed Tony D'silva, currently President, Hinduja Ventures Limited, as Managing Director and CEO of IMCL with immediate effect and also approved certain other key management changes.

In order to consolidate all media initiatives of HVL, D'silva is being redesignated as Group CEO, Media of Hinduja Ventures. As Group CEO – Media and MD & CEO of IMCL, D'silva will hold the responsibility to restructure the entire media business and for value creation.

D'silva has been associated with Hinduja Ventures for the last one and a half years and comes with more than four decades of experience spread across media, FMCG and pharma sectors holding senior positions. He has a creditable track record of setting up and scaling up media ventures. D'silva began his media foray in 1992 as CEO of Modi Entertainment, and in 1997 he helped ZEE TV launch its international business in UK. Upon his return to India in 2001, he joined Star as Executive VP and consolidated its TV business. He joined the Sun Group in 2007 to set up Sun Direct DTH as CEO, and then took over as Group CEO, overseeing its entire media business including TV, Print and Radio.

Hinduja Ventures Limited (HVL) is the holding company of one of India's largest integrated media companies, IndusInd Media & Communications. With an estimated 8.5 million subscribers across 36 major cities, the company offers over 350 channels in the digital mode. It has a backbone of over 10,000 km of hybrid fibre optic network through which it also offers broadband services with its national ISP licence. IMCL has gone ahead with the first two phases of the digital revolution being ushered in by the government's mandated policy of digitising cable networks. The Digital Addressable System (DAS) was introduced by Government on 1^st November 2012, in phases and offers a unique opportunity to IMCL to make all its subscribers addressable and monetise its subscription revenues manifold. IMCL has planned new services for the digital cable foray, apart from the broadband services such as HD, hybrid STBs for cable and internet and value added services for digital cable.

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