Disney Hires Karandeep Anand as First SEVP & CTO

The Walt Disney Company has appointed Karandeep Anand as its first Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer (SEVP & CTO), effective October 2, 2026. Anand will oversee infrastructure, data, and artificial intelligence platforms, enterprise technology, product, and engineering teams to build and deliver advanced technologies across the company.

Anand has a diverse background in technology leadership roles at Microsoft, where he spent 15 years from 2000 to 2015. He began as an intern while pursuing his undergraduate degree at IIIT Hyderabad. He joined Microsoft Azure in 2002 as a partner/director of product management and worked out of the Greater Seattle Area for 12 years.

After leaving Microsoft, Anand held various roles at Facebook Infrastructure and Payments, Gaming Analytics, and Developer Platform. He also served as Vice President of Product, Marketplace/Commerce, and Payments before moving to Brex in January 2022 as President/Chief Product Officer.

Anand joined Character.AI in October 2024 as a board advisor and became CEO in May 2025. Now, he will leverage his expertise at Disney to drive technological advancements across the company.