The Wall Street Journal reported that the two CEOs would step down Monday morning and be replaced by Thorston Heins, who has been RIM’s chief operating officer. They will both stay on RIM’s board, but will no longer have executive roles at the company founded by Lazaridis and overseen by the duo for nearly two decades.

The company confirmed the move in a press release following the published report, and Balsillie and Lazardis granted interviews to the WSJ in conjunction with release of the report, interestingly timed for the middle of the San Francisco 49ers-New York Giants championship game in San Francisco. In the report, they said they were not pushed from their roles but it’s hard to take that at face value, given that RIM was under serious pressure from investors to release a plan for management changes by the end of January following a deal cut just before its annual meeting last July.

Lazaridis will become vice chair of RIM’s board and will chair something called the Innovation Committee. RIM said he will provide “strategic counsel” to Heins and will apparently be much more active than Balsillie, who will remain on the board but with no new public role. Barbara Stymiest, a current RIM board member, will become Board Chair.

The former CEOs, as well as Heins, also spoke to their hometown paper, the Globe and Mail, in advance of actually announcing the move. Heims has been chief operating officer of product engineering for RIM following a reorganization last year in which RIM laid off employees and attempted to streamline its operation. But that wasn’t enough to prevent the company from making several more product and strategic mistakes during the latter half of 2012.

RIM is in deep trouble for taking far too long to react to the launch of the iPhone, a seminal moment in the modern mobile computing industry that was initially dismissed by RIM’s management has having been faked by Apple (NSDQ: AAPL). Changing consumer tastes for smartphones led to a precipitous drop in RIM’s U.S. market share in 2010 and throughout 2011, and the company has fumbled several attempts to catch up. New BlackBerry 7 handsets were delayed in 2011 after RIM miscalculated the processing power that would be required, and a similar mistake led to the delay of its first QNX-based smartphones, which were supposed to appear in early 2012 but now aren’t expected until the end of the year.

Heins promised the Globe and Mail that “what you will see with me is rigour and flawless execution.” That’s something RIM could surely use following all the product delays, but the company also needs to articulate a clearer vision for how it intends to transition between the staid BlackBerry OS and the newer QNX operating system, which RIM has renamed BlackBerry 10 yet struggled to get anyone to notice the software following the failed launch of its Playbook tablet.

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NEW YORK, Jan. 20, 2012 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE)—The Wall Street Journal has named Raju Narisetti as Managing Editor of The Wall Street Journal Digital Network, which includes WSJ.com, SmartMoney.com, MarketWatch and the Chinese, Japanese and German-language editions of WSJ.com. Mr. Narisetti will also become a Deputy Managing Editor of the Journal, and he will report to Alan Murray, Deputy Managing Editor and Executive Editor, Online.

Mr. Narisetti currently serves as Managing Editor for The Washington Post (NYSE: WPO), where he oversees the company’s digital content products, staff and strategy. Today’s appointment marks a return to the Journal for Mr. Narisetti, who first joined the paper in 1994 as a reporter in Pittsburgh and most recently served as Editor of The Wall Street Journal Europe in 2006.

“Raju has done remarkable work as the digital czar at the Washington Post, integrating print and online businesses, building a successful web site, and developing key relationships with the digerati,” said Robert Thomson, Editor-in-Chief of Dow Jones and Managing Editor of the Journal. “His experience in creating Mint, a national web site and newspaper in India, also brings important relationships and unique expertise that will assist us as we expand our global digital network. Raju is wired, and we are jazzed.”

“Raju knows the world, knows digital journalism, and knows the Journal,” said Mr. Murray. “He is the perfect person to lead us into a new era of global growth.”

Mr. Narisetti’s appointment follows the recent departure of WSJ.com Managing Editor Kevin Delaney.

Strong Digital Growth from New Content, Product Offerings and Global Expansion

The Wall Street Journal Digital Network has seen tremendous growth in recent years with the introduction of expanded news coverage, content and new products as well as increased usage across its Web sites, mobile applications and tablet editions. The network has more than 1.3 million paid digital subscribers across multiple platforms and devices, and averages more than 50 million visitors per month online.

WSJ.com’s success has been buoyed by an expansion in politics, national and world news, sports and lifestyle coverage, as well as live and on-demand video, real-time blogs and the launch of premium verticals. WSJ.com generated a 42% year-over-year increase in traffic in 2011, averaging more than 36 million visitors per month worldwide. The new WSJ Live interactive video application is already available to millions of users via the iPad and multiple Internet-connected televisions and set-top boxes.

Globally, more than 30% of the total digital audience comes from outside the North American market, including Asia, which generates more than 11 million visitors per month, and nearly six million from Europe, Middle East and Africa. In 2011, traffic to the Journal’s Chinese- and Japanese-language Web sites increased 38% and 150%, respectively.

To further serve its expanding global audience, the Journal and Dow Jones have launched a series of regionally focused digital initiatives – the most recent of which, a German-language news site (WSJ.de), launched earlier this month. Other regional offerings are available, including China, Japan, Korea, India, Southeast Asia, and Central and Eastern Europe.

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From Yang’s letter to the board:

“My time at Yahoo!, from its founding to the present, has encompassed some of the most exciting and rewarding experiences of my life. However, the time has come for me to pursue other interests outside of Yahoo! As I leave the company I co-founded nearly 17 years ago, I am enthusiastic about the appointment of Scott Thompson as Chief Executive Officer and his ability, along with the entire Yahoo! leadership team, to guide Yahoo! into an exciting and successful future.”

It is a surprising move but only in its timing and its thoroughness. Activist shareholders—most notably Third Point’s Daniel Loeb—have called for his resignation, concerned in part that Yang was on the board while he was exploring ways to take the company private.

Yang also has stepped back before, resigning as CEO—but always keeing a connection. This time, Yang—aka the “Chief Yahoo”—is severing all ties with the company he and David Filo founded in 1995 for the navigational guide they developed as students at Stanford in 1994.  He has been on the board since 1995, was CEO from 2007-2009, and at this writing, still anchors the management page.

That page is headed now by Scott Thompson, the PayPal president who joined Yahoo as CEO just two weeks ago, replacing Carol Bartz, who was fired on Labor Day. Yang’s departure letter includes a shout out for Thompson, who in press-release speak thanked Yang for “the warm welcome and support Jerry provided me during my early days here.”  Thompson’s first earnings call in next Tuesday.

But Yang can’t get completely away: he’s still one of the company’s largest individual shareholders. And resigning won’t really help him escape the blame for Yahoo’s failure to thrive as an investment or to set a strong course, no matter how many highlights the company’s been able to string together. It also doesn’t blot out the memory of failing to sell to Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) when the price was right.

What it does do is remove him as an impediment, imagined or real, to Yahoo’s future and leaves Roy Bostock, chairman of the board, as the lead voodoo doll for outside investors and critics to stick pins in until he, too, goes away. (Kara Swisher’s sources say Bostock and three others will be leaving soon: board vets Arthur Kern, Vyomesh Joshi, and Gary Wilson.)

Unless, of course, resigning from the boards of Yahoo, Yahoo Japan and and Alibaba Group is a palette cleanser for an effort to work outside the company to take it private.

I hope not. I hope Yang is sincere when he says it’s time to pursue interests outside of Yahoo! (I’ll give him the exclamation point this once).

It’s bittersweet to watch someone who has given his all, sometimes with stunning results and sometimes with outcomes far less than desired, decide what’s best for him—and the company—is to move on.

The sweet bit comes from knowing Jerry Yang has a lot more left to accomplish.

Yahoo! Stock Chart by YCharts

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Deogun is among the highest ranking journalists of Indian origin in American journalism and will be a rare Indian top editor on American television. Mumbai-born Hari Sreenivasan was recently in the news for his move to PBS.

Deogun was born in Assam, grew up in Calcutta and holds a B.A. from Muskingum College, Ohio, and a masters in journalism from the University of Missouri (via SAJA Forum).

With this, two senior editorial staffers have stepped down at the Mumbai-headquartered daily in as many months. Editor-at-large Ayaz Memon had resigned last month. The daily is widely believed to be going through a shakeup, but CEO K.U. Rao denied anything was unusual. “This is all part of normal attrition,” he said.

Bhatia has worked as a journalist for 33 years, starting as a reporter at the Free Press Journal in 1976. He has worked in senior roles at The Independent, The Observer and on the India Business Week show on Star TV. He also helped launch French daily Le Matinal in Mauritius.

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Union home secretary G.K. Pillai today said India’s software firms are high on the target list of terrorists. The government is working with many such firms to ensure adequate security, Pillai said.

Tech firm HCL yesterday said it has entered into a multi million pound, five-year, technology infrastructure management and transformation agreement with News International, a division of News Corp (NYSE: NWS).

TGBCL CEO Chintamani Rao has been named vice chairman. Rao, who is currently based in Mumbai, will move to New Delhi and also handle responsibilities in the group’s Private Treaties business, BCCL MD Vineet Jain said in an internal memo. Lulla will report to Jain.

Lulla joins TGBCL effective today and he will also oversee Zoom. The CEO of that channel, Suresh Bala, will now report to Lulla.

Lulla joined the company as a director in February 2008 and also sat on the boards of group companies Miditech and Real Global Broadcasting. He set up Real under a joint venture with Turner Broadcasting. The channel launched in March 2009 as a general entertainment channel with a special focus on reality shows. It never really took off, however, and in September, Turner and Alva Brothers said the companies were “reassessing” their plans for the channel. Operations have been significantly downsized. With Lulla’s exit, little remains to be wound down at the channel. Joint venture partner Turner is reportedly in talks to buy a stake in NDTV Imagine.

Lulla was the CEO of Times Global Broadcasting prior to joining Alva Brothers. He has also worked in senior roles at Sony (NYSE: SNE) Entertainment Television, JWT and MTV, among others.

Aditya joined UTV Broadcasting as executive director in April 2007. He oversaw four channels—Bindass, Bindass Movies, UTV Movies and World Movies. In June 2008, when Arun Anant quit as the CEO of UTVi, Aditya took on additional responsibilities as the CEO of the business news channel.

In September, UTV hired M.K. Anand as the CEO of UTV Broadcasting to oversee the four channels. Anand was business head at Zoom prior to joining UTV. Subsequently, Aditya relinquished his responsibilities on the entertainment side of the business and continued with his duties as the CEO of Bloomberg UTV.

With his departure, our source said, Anand would take over as the CEO of the business channel as well. Aditya declined comment for this story, as did a spokesperson for UTV.

Aditya has put in 25 years in the business and is a specialist of broadcasting distribution. Prior to UTV, he was CEO of Sahara One Media and Entertainment Ltd. He has also worked as president at SET Discovery India Pvt Ltd and has also worked at Sony (NYSE: SNE) Entertainment Television. 

Panicker declined to comment for this story. A Yahoo India spokesperson also declined to comment.

Panicker is currently based in Mumbai. Yahoo India’s editorial operations are based out of Bangalore.

Panicker has been with Rediff since October 1995 (Rediff.com launched in January 1996). Prior to that, he was a senior editor at Sunday Observer. Between 2002 and 2006, he was based out of New York, editing India Abroad. Panicker is a cricket writer of note and is also a popular blogger. He was a key member of the startup team that built Rediff.com into one of the earliest sources of news and information on India on the Web. 

This is the third recent high-ranking departure from Rediff (NSDQ: REDF). CFO Joy Chakrobarty and Zaki Ansari, VP, product development, had left in August (more in this story).

If the move comes about, Panicker will likely report to Yahoo India MD Arun Tadanki, who came on board in April. Once Panicker joins, Yahoo India will have filled two key roles that have been vacant for a considerable period.

Fox Television Studios is the TV production unit of News Corp.‘s Fox Entertainment Group, and is a leading producer of TV shows globally, alongside companies such as Mediaset-controlled Endemol and Bertelsmann AG’s Fremantle Media. Endemol has had a good run in India, with shows such as Bigg Boss, while Fremantle recently said it is setting up shop in India. 

News Corp.-owned Star India is the country’s leading private broadcaster.

Both Pantvaidya and Fox TV Studios India’s current head, Mohinder Walia, were unreachable for comment. Neither responded to text messages.

Pantvaidya was, till recently, CEO of Balaji Telefilms’ TV content business. Prior to that, he worked at BBC Worldwide as general manager, south Asia, for its global channels business. A graduate of IIM Ahmedabad, he has also worked as executive director, programming and production, at Walt Disney (NYSE: DIS) India.

India TV was founded by journalist Rajat Sharma and is regularly ranked among the top three most viewed Hindi news channels. Its content often attracts controversy. More on the firm from a previous story here. 

“I feel sad to be leaving behind a team that did such entrepreneural work. But life has to move on and it’s time to find a role that captures my existing skills with the knowledge I have acquired at HBS,” Bansal said. He recently attended a two-month advanced management programme at the Harvard Business School.

He declined to say what his next move was, but his LinkedIn profile says his current position is chief executive candidate at TBA (to be announced).

Bansal joined India TV in 2004 as editor, business and was named executive editor and managing editor before becoming COO in January 2008 with no editorial responsibilities. A week later, the company announced the departure of then CEO Chintamani Rao. The channel has not had a CEO since.

Prior to joining India TV, Bansal was the Delhi resident editor of The Financial Express. He has also worked as business editor at Zee News and helped set up Zee Business. He also helped set up two real estate companies for that group. Bansal has also worked at TV18 and The Times of India. He holds an undergraduate degree in History from St. Stephens College.

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Rohatgi spent seven years at Star India and was GM and senior VP, content and communication, prior to joining NDTV Imagine in 2007. His departure from Imagine, where he is a key member of the management team, is panning out even as the channel is just days away from signing a majority stake sale agreement with Turner Broadcasting.

At Nat Geo, Rohatgi will replace Nikhil Mirchandani, who recently moved to Star India as general manager and EVP for Star One channel. Star India and NGC are both controlled by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation.

A Star Group spokesperson declined comment.

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Memon confirmed the development, but declined to comment further.

Prior to joining DNA, he worked for five years at The Times of India as national sports editor and the editor of Bombay Times, the daily’s city-focussed lifestyle and entertainment supplement. Prior to that Memon worked at Mid-Day for 19 years in two stints and rose to become the editor of the tabloid. He also worked at Independent.

Memon, a regular TV commentator on cricket, is well known in Mumbai’s sports and entertainment circles.

We have heard of more exits from DNA, but haven’t been able to confirm anything yet. If you have any information, please leave an anonymous tip or mail me at sk [at] contentsutra [dot] com. 

Prior to this, Endlaw was VP for digital and interactive at INX Media, the firm that broadcasts the channels 9X and 9X Music. He has also worked at Airtel and Indiatimes.

The JV will focus on bringing Zed’s content to India, Endlaw said. “We have some pathbreaking programmes that will help increase content consumption,” he said, adding that the JV can either use Tanla’s existing relationships with telecom operators or forge its own relationships.

One of the first products to be rolled out will be MyFree, a programme that gives away content for free to users for a certain period of time. “Our focus is to increase consumption of all kinds of content. We are not in a hurry to monetize it immediately,” Endlaw said. 

Thomas has been with Red FM since March 2005 and helped grow it into the top rated station in Mumbai, the country’s largest radio market in terms of ad revenues. Prior to Red FM, he has worked at The Indian Express, Set Max and MTV Networks (NYSE: VIA). E4M first reported his departure.

Red FM is owned by Sun TV Networks promoter Kalanidhi Maran and operates in 42 cities.

Akbar confirmed the development. “It’s a welcome development and a prelude to our growth.”

When asked about the magazine’s expansion plans, Akbar said Covert is looking to expand, especially in the National Capital Region. “Having established our base and credibility, we are indeed gearing up for expansion, especially in Delhi and NCR,” he said.

Akbar declined to discuss details about the magazine’s sales growth or revenues and wouldn’t say if it was in the process of raising money. “You shall see what you shall see,” he said. 

DEN is going for an IPO at the price band of Rs195-205. The IPO is of 20 million equity shares of a face value of Rs10.

Reliance ADAG Group’s online DVD rental and video-on-demand website, BigFlix.com, has partnered with Hulu.com to bring Bollywood movies to Indians in the US. Initially, 12 Bollywood films will be made available on Hulu and the companies target to eventually take this figure to 500 films, BigFlix said in a statement. Four films are currently available for viewing in the US on Hulu.com—Gangster, Apaharan, Kalyug and Black Friday.

Jaipur-based IPL franchise team Rajasthan Royals, which won the inaugural 20/20 tournament in 2008, has launched a revamped website “to strengthen its connect with its fan base”. 

“In his role, Seshasaye will be responsible for overall Marketing and Distribution strategy for the theatrical slate. He will also be working closely with UTV Motion Pictures on the film distribution,” the company said in a statement. 

Prior to Mint, John has worked at The Financial Express, Reuters, Business Standard and The Economic Times and has been an India writer for BusinessWeek.

Business Today has seen a fair bit of churn at the top editorial ranks during the past few years. While managing editor R. Sukumar left to join Mint in 2006, both editor Sanjoy Narayan and managing editor R. Sridharan left the magazine during 2008. Narayan became editor-in-chief at Hindustan Times while Sridharan is senior editor at business channel ET Now.