Karandeep Anand: IIIT-Hyderabad grad who led at Microsoft, Meta to be Disney CTO

Karandeep Anand's career has moved through some of the biggest names in technology, from Microsoft and Meta to fintech company Brex and AI chatbot platform Character.AI. Now, the IIIT Hyderabad alumnus is heading to one of the world's best-known entertainment companies.

Disney has appointed Anand as its first-ever company-wide Chief Technology Officer, with the newly created role taking effect on October 2. He will report directly to Disney CEO Josh D'Amaro and oversee enterprise technology, infrastructure, data and AI platforms, product and engineering.advertisement❮❯ Read Full StoryFROM IIIT HYDERABAD TO MICROSOFTAnand graduated from the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad, in 2003 with a BTech (Honours) in Computer Science and Engineering.

The institute named him among its 2026 Alumni Achiever Award winners earlier this month. At the time, he was recognised for his work as CEO of Character.AI and his career across technology and product leadership.

His longest corporate stint was at Microsoft, where he spent 15 years in product and engineering leadership roles. He was part of the team that helped build the Azure platform, giving him experience in cloud technology well before generative AI became the industry's dominant conversation.THEN CAME META AND BREX

Anand later moved to Facebook, where he spent several years in senior roles and eventually became Vice President of Ads and Business Products.

His work there involved products serving hundreds of millions of businesses across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp.

He then joined Brex, the fintech company serving businesses, as Chief Product Officer before becoming President. During his time there, he was involved in products including Brex Assistant and the company's spend management platform.FROM CHATBOTS TO DISNEY

In June 2025, Anand became CEO of Character.AI, the generative AI platform where users interact with AI characters and create their own chatbots.

Under his leadership, the company expanded beyond text-based chatbot experiences into areas including video generation and other entertainment formats. IIIT Hyderabad says Character.AI had 20 million monthly active users worldwide when it profiled Anand as a 2026 Alumni Achiever.

Now, that AI and consumer technology experience is taking him to Disney.

As CTO, Anand will work across Disney's businesses, with the company saying his mandate will include modernising how it builds and uses technology. Disney CEO Josh D'Amaro described him as having experience across infrastructure, consumer technology and AI.

The appointment also places an AI and technology veteran at the centre of Disney's push to connect its entertainment, sports, streaming and experiences businesses through technology.

For the 2003 IIIT Hyderabad graduate, the next chapter begins on October 2, when he becomes the first person to hold Disney's company-wide CTO role.- EndsPublished By: Roshni Published On: Sep 22, 2026 12:43 ISTRead | Google was Aravind Srinivas's middle-class dream. Perplexity made him CEORead | Meet IITian Nandan Nilekani, Aadhaar architect leading exam reform task force