Karandeep Singh Anand

Karandeep Anand is the Senior Executive Vice President and first-ever Chief Technology Officer of The Walt Disney Company, a role he assumes on October 2, 2026. In this newly created position, he oversees enterprise technology, infrastructure, data and AI platforms, product, and engineering across Disney’s global businesses. His appointment reflects Disney’s push to modernize its technology stack, deepen direct fan relationships, and strengthen Disney+ as the digital centerpiece of its entertainment strategy.

Before joining Disney, Anand served as CEO of Character.AI, where he led the generative‑AI entertainment platform through rapid audience growth while emphasizing user trust and safety. Several members of Character.AI’s technical team are expected to join him at Disney. Prior to Character.AI, he was President and Chief Product Officer at Brex, guiding the launch of Brex Assistant and the Empower spend‑management platform.

Earlier in his career, Anand held senior leadership roles at Meta, most recently as Vice President of Ads & Business Products, serving billions of users and millions of businesses across Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger. He spent 15 years at Microsoft, where he helped build and scale the Azure cloud platform. Anand holds a computer science degree from IIIT Hyderabad and completed executive training at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.