PepsiCo India has appointed Vivek Bharati, an economist and external affairs expert, as Executive Director – External Affairs, PepsiCo India. He will succeed Abhiram Seth, who is retiring after having led the External Affairs & Exports function since 2002. Prior to joining PepsiCo, Bharati has been associated with FICCI as Advisor-National Policy & Programmes. He also worked with the World Bank as Advisor to the Country Director. Prior to his stint at the World Bank, Bharati has held various senior editorial roles in The Economic Times, The Times of India and Hindustan Times. His last assignment in the publishing industry was as Editor, The Economic Times-Delhi.

Kaushik Mitra has moved from Leo Burnett to join Bates David Enterprise as Creative Director. Mitra started his career with Clarion (which became Bates) in Kolkata in 1994 as Copywriter. He spent six years there and worked on ITC (Gold Flake, 555), Berger Paints and Taj Bengal. In 2000, he moved to Mumbai as Group Head for Leo Burnett where he handled Bajaj two-wheeler brands Caliber, Boxer and Eliminator; Hitachi air-conditioners; Fiat cars; IndianOil; McDonald’s and Reliance Mobile. Mitra was responsible for the McDonald’s ‘Humare Zamana ke Daam’ campaign.

Rohit Malkani, who was Creative Director, Publicis Ambience Mumbai, has joined Bates David Enterprise as Creative Director-Copy. In his five-year stint at Publicis Ambience, he headed the creative team on the Marico brands, apart from working on P&G’s Vicks, and Bisleri mineral water. Before that, Malkani was with P***tasia.com for two years, where he developed the brand strategy and online identity for several companies/brands. Prior to this, Malkani worked with JWT Bangalore, where he spent close to six years handling Taj Mahal Tea, Red Label Tea, Lipton Yellow Label, Kingfisher, Acer, McDowell, Kerala Tourism, Standard Chartered credit cards and Van Heusen.

Joseph D’Souza, who was Creative Director-Art at JWT, has moved to Bates David Enterprise. D’Souza started his career over 14 years ago at Leo Burnett as a visualiser on the P&G businesses (Ariel, Vicks, Heinz and Complan). He then moved to Grey Worldwide (then Trikaya Grey), where he handled Ambuja Cement and Kinetic bikes and scooters. Four years later, he joined JWT where he looked after Smirnoff, Club HP (Turbojet and Power), Philips India and Baskin Robbins.

K Madhavan Pillai has been appointed Executive Editor of ‘Better Photography’, published by Infomedia India Ltd. Pillai has been associated with the magazine from its inception. Before joining Infomedia, he was branch head in a public relations company. He has also been a publishing consultant. Apart from commercial assignments in photography, Pillai has produced several independent video documentaries and corporate films.

Aravind Sampathkumaran has joined local search engine AskLaila.com as Chief Product Officer. Prior to joining AskLaila, Sampathkumaran was Group Product Manager, Windows Live, at Microsoft Corp. He will be responsible for product vision and strategy, product design and development, product marketing and management, business development and distribution. Sampathkumaran brings with him over 14 years of experience in technology marketing and evangelism, including 10 years at Microsoft.

Award-winning journalist and news programming executive Katherine Green has been appointed Senior VP-Programming by CNN International. Green, most recently VP/News Director of WTTG/ Fox 5 News in Washington, D.C., will be based at the network's world headquarters in Atlanta. She will now oversee all of the editorial production, programme development, network talent and day-to-day operations of CNN International.

Mike McCarthy, Managing Editor for CNN International, has been promoted to the new position of VP-Coverage and Feature Programmes. He will oversee major breaking news and the growing strand of feature programmes produced in CNN's London, Hong Kong and Atlanta production centres. McCarthy has served as CNN International's Atlanta-based Managing Editor since November 2002.

Santosh Kumar has joined HT.com as Head of Ad Sales-South. He will be looking after Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad markets. Kumar will be reporting to HT.com National Sales Head Pooja Puri. His last stint was with Monster.com as Key Account Manager for two years. He was earlier with Tata Infomedia for five years.