Indian Joint Venture Viacom18 Names Sudhanshu Vats Group CEO

NEW DELHI - Viacom18 Media Private Ltd. has appointed Sudhanshu Vats, 44, as its group CEO.

Viacom18 is an equal joint venture between Viacom and leading Indian broadcasting and media group Network18. Vats fills the position vacated by outgoing Network18 CEO Haresh Chawla who resigned in November.

Reporting to the Viacom18 board, Vats will be based in Mumbai and will officially join the company in August. He will be responsible for all Viacom18 businesses, which include Hindi entertainment channel Colors, Comedy Central, MTV, VH-1, kids channels Nick and Sonic and film banner Viacom18 Motion Pictures.  

Vats is a veteran in consumer goods marketing having worked at Unilever India for almost two decades with his latest position at the company being that of vp, soaps and detergents.

“Given Sudhanshu’s rich experience, his ability to lead large businesses and his acute understanding of the Indian diaspora, he is well poised to lead Viacom18 into its next phase of growth,” said Network18 Group founder Raghav Bahl.

“With Sudhanshu on board, we’re confident that Viacom18 will continue to redefine the many spaces it operates in,” added Viacom International Media Networks president and CEO Bob Bakish.

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Readers "jump into" classics in publishing venture

The Amazon Kindle Wi-Fi e-book reader is shown in this publicity photo released to Reuters on July 28, 2010.

Credit: Reuters/Amazon.com/Handout

LONDON | Mon Jun 13, 2011 7:06pm EDT

LONDON (Reuters) - Readers will be able to "jump" from a new adventure series into children's classics "Treasure Island" and "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" in a new digital book initiative launched on Amazon's Kindle on Tuesday.

Written by children's author David Gatward and targeting children aged 9-12, the "Booksurfers" series features four children -- Jake, Becca, Ryan and Harriet -- who are kidnapped by an arch-criminal and his evil henchwoman.

They are forced to jump "into" the classic adventure stories to steal famous fictional artefacts such as the map in Treasure Island, using a gadget called the Nautilus.

Readers using the Kindle will be able to switch to the original text of the classic story in what organisers said was an original way for youngsters to experience famous old stories they often encountered only in the movie theater.

Booksurfers was created by intellectual property development company FourteenFiftyFour Ltd, and will be available only in e-book format in the English language through Amazon worldwide. Each adventure comes bundled with the original story.

"There are many fantastic stories from the past few centuries which younger audiences are only familiar with through other representations such as film," said Zoe Watkins, creative director at FourteenFiftyFour.

"Booksurfers gives young readers an opportunity to discover and interact with classic stories in an exciting new way."

"Robin Hood" and "A Christmas Carol" will be published later this year as part of the initiative.

(Reporting by Mike Collett-White, editing by Paul Casciato)

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