OpenAI Snags Meta's India Boss as Meta Faces India Crackdown

Meta's vice president for India and Southeast Asia, Sandhya Devanathan, is leaving the company after more than a decade to join OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT. She will oversee consumer growth, enterprise adoption, partnerships, and operations across Southeast Asia and Australia, working from Singapore. It's a major hiring win for OpenAI, which is aggressively building its presence in Asia Pacific.

Over the past two years, OpenAI has opened offices in Singapore, Tokyo, Seoul, Sydney, and Delhi. Days before Devanathan's move, the company also hired Uber's former India head, Prabhjeet Singh, to run its India business. These hires show OpenAI sees Asia as essential to its growth and is willing to pull experienced leaders from established tech companies to get there.

Devanathan's departure comes at a difficult time for Meta in India. Instagram recently apologized after it mistakenly restricted a post by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Indian authorities have also raised concerns about child sexual abuse material on Meta's platforms, and the government has summoned Meta executives. Meta says it removed 160,000 accounts in India over six months for child-exploitative activity and rejected accusations that it knowingly targeted such ads.

For regular users, this story highlights two trends: AI companies are growing fast and hiring top talent from older tech giants, while social media companies are facing more pushback from governments. India is now a key battleground for both AI adoption and content moderation. When executives move between these powerful companies, it can change how tech products are built, regulated, and trusted in your region.