Raj Jain, who was roped in as chief executive of Bharti Retail earlier this year after a stint as the head of Walmart India, is moving on to join Bennett Coleman & Company Ltd (BCCL), as its CEO, sources privy to the development told VCCircle.
BCCL is the private holding company of The Times Of India Group, one of the largest media organisations in the country with print publications like The Times of India and Filmfare; TV channels like Times Now and Movies Now besides a host of business interest in areas like FM radio, internet commerce, etc. It also has an ad-for-equity investment arm Brand Capital.
Owned by the Jain family (not related to Raj Jain), BCCL is currently led by Ravi Dhariwal. Dhariwal, who has been with the group for more than a decade, is retiring.
Brothers Samir and Vineet Jain, vice chairman and managing director of BCC, respectively, are closely associated with the management of the group. Even as Satyan Gajwani, son-in-law of Samir Jain, is heading Times Internet, the day to day affairs of different business units are managed by professionals.
Raj Jain's move to BCCL comes in less than a year after he was named CEO of Bharti Retail, the privately held retail arm of the Bharti Group. Jain had quit Walmart India in June last year where he was president of Walmart India and also played the role of a managing director and chief executive officer of Bharti Walmart Pvt Ltd, the wholesale cash & carry joint venture between Walmart and Bharti Enterprises.
Last year Walmart and Bharti had decided to part ways in their retail JV.
Prior to Walmart, Jain was the Asia Pacific Region head, marketing and supply chain at Whirlpool Corporation in Shanghai and had also served as managing director & CEO of Whirlpool of India Ltd. He had started his career at FMCG major Hindustan Lever (now Hindustan Unilever).
At Bharti Retail, Jain was reporting directly to Rajan Bharti Mittal—the youngest of three Mittal brothers—who has been in charge of the privately held retail business of the group.
Bharti Retail operates neighbourhood retail chains under the Easyday brand spread across the north India region besides states like Maharashtra in the west and Karnataka in the south.
HT Media, a close rival to BCCL in the publishing business, is also led by a former Whirlpool executive Rajiv Verma. Verma has been the CEO of the public listed media firm since 2004.
(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)