Twitter India appoints Viral Jani as Head of TV partnerships

Twitter India today said it has appointed Viral Jani as Head of TV partnerships and will spearhead strategic collaboration with TV channels to increase their audience engagement on Twitter.

"As part of his new role, Jani will work closely with the complete TV ecosystem of broadcasters, production houses and audience measurement systems to make Twitter the second screen to TV in India," the micro-blogging platform said in a statement.

Jani will lead the social TV movement in India in two ways - by bringing the best content from TV channels to Twitter's platform for live, public conversations, while enabling Twitter as an incredible video and visual-driven story-telling platform to drive tune-in and audience engagement for the TV channels, it said.

Going forward, they will try to position Twitter as the largest virtual couch for viewing TV content in India, and facilitate broadcasters to use the full suite of Twitter's products such as Twitter native video, Twitter Amplify, Vine, Periscope, SnappyTV and TV analytics.

Twitter is the ultimate companion to television and we have invested considerable time and effort in partnerships with TV broadcasters worldwide to ensure they are able to amplify the live, public conversations about their shows on our platform.

In his new role, Viral will expand Twitter's leadership and footprint in the social TV market in India, prioritising TV partners that drive audience engagement and growth," Twitter Vice President, Media Asia Pacific and Middle East, Rishi Jaitly said.

Jani has over 12 years of experience in the media industry and has previously worked at broadcasting group Times Television Network, where he was instrumental in building a strong social media presence for their channels - Times Now, Zoom and ET Now.

Prior to joining the Times Television Network, Jani handled assignments for some of the biggest media houses in India like NDTV, Disney, Viacom and Mindshare.