Disney on Friday named former Character.AI chief executive Karandeep Anand as its chief technology officer. He will report to new CEO Josh D’Amaro, who recently took over the role from Bob Iger.
A number of Character.AI’s technical staff are expected to follow Anand to Disney, where he will oversee enterprise technology, AI platforms and engineering across the company’s business segments.
The appointment comes about a year after Disney accused Character.AI of “blatantly infringing” its copyrights and sent the tech startup a cease-and-desist letter demanding that it remove Disney characters from its platform. Character.AI complied with the request.
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Before joining Character.AI, Anand served as president and chief product officer of financial technology company Brex. He also held several leadership roles at Facebook, most recently as vice president of ads and business products.
Earlier in his career, Anand held senior product and engineering leadership roles at Microsoft, where he worked for 15 years and was part of the team that built the Azure cloud-computing platform.
“Karandeep brings a rare mix of experience across infrastructure, consumer technology and AI, and will be a vital addition to Disney’s senior leadership team as we further our three priorities: great storytelling as our North Star, technology in service of creativity, and operating as One Disney,” D’Amaro said in a statement. “He is an expert builder and strategist, technical and product-minded, with sharp instincts for what fans actually want.”
D’Amaro added, “He also has real enthusiasm and respect for Disney, a clear sense of where technology and creativity meet, and shares our belief that technology creates the most value when it helps people do their best work.”
As CTO, Anand will oversee enterprise technology, infrastructure, data and AI platforms, product and engineering. He will work across Disney’s technology teams to “further modernize” how the company builds and delivers technology across the organization.
Disney has not officially had a CTO until now. Its highest-ranking technology executive was previously Adam Smith, whom Disney promoted Thursday to chairman of direct-to-consumer for Disney Entertainment.
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Disney hired Smith in 2024. The former vice president of product management at YouTube joined as chief product and technology officer for Disney Entertainment and ESPN. He also served as co-president of direct-to-consumer alongside Joe Earley, who now holds the newly created role of president of Disney Entertainment Television franchise and content strategy.
Anand said in a statement, “I’ve admired Disney my entire life for how it blends unforgettable storytelling with the latest technology to constantly push the boundaries of what entertainment can be. I’m honored to join a team with such extraordinary creative talent, and I look forward to building on the company’s impressive technology capabilities to help Disney connect fans worldwide with its beloved stories and characters in new and innovative ways.”