Netflix India has hired Gaurav Pradhan and Swati Shetty in key senior executive roles. Pradhan is the director, business development, Asia, while Shetty will oversee the production and acquisition of original content.
Pradhan’s territories of focus will be India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. He was formerly head of international product partnerships at YouTube and prior to that had stints with Yahoo and Vodafone.
Shetty’s most recent stint was as founder/director of Samosa Stories Entertainment during which time she produced “Umrika” that won the audience award in the world cinema – dramatic category at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival. She was previously president, motion pictures at Balaji Telefilms where she oversaw the hit “The Dirty Picture”, and was executive director at Walt Disney International productions India before that, during which time she oversaw one of Disney’s first Indian productions “Once Upon a Warrior”.
Netflix launched in India in January. In June, the streaming service commissioned Phantom Films to produce a Hindi- and English-language adaptation of author Vikram Chandra’s critically acclaimed bestselling novel “Sacred Games” as the first Netflix original series made in India.
