Flurry of top management movement in Indian online space

We are witnessing a change at the top management amongst the major online players in India. What is interesting to note is that most of these changes are from within the new media / technology space.

MSN India: Jaspreet Bindra appointed as MSN India Country Manager February 08, 06

Indiatimes: Dinesh Wadhawan of Microsoft joining Times Internet as CEO Feb 07, 06

Yahoo India: George Zacharias Logs Out of Sify To Join Yahoo! India As Managing Director Wed 18 Jan 2006

We now are seeing a renewed focus of the existing and new global players on their Indian operations / India strategy. Google recently has also formally launched their Indian sales operations . Online players in India are also gearing their organisations to face up to the challenge of realizing the potential of a growing internet business.

It will be interesting to see if any of these guys can have the same kind of impact that Terry Semel, the former executive of Warner Bros studio has had on Yahoo. Semel joined Yahoo as CEO in 2001 when Yahoo was trying to redefine itself after the dotcom bust. He has led a successful transition of Yahoo by focusing on marketing and consumer services. Semel not only rejuvenated Yahoo's ad business but he also instilled what Businessweek refers to as a “theme-park mentality” – Yahoo's various Internet services, from e-mail account to travel, interact increasingly with one another ensuring that the customer stays within Yahoo.

As the Internet space explodes in India, there will be a need to get talent from outside the industry to fill in the leadership roles. I am sure we will see this happening in the near future.
Let us hope that at least some of them turn out to be Terry Semels.