After 100 days on the top seat at Facebook India, Umang Bedi says “Facebook moves fast”

Umang Bedi was appointed the Managing Director of Facebook India shortly after the social networking giant received one of the biggest blows in the country when the telecom regulator of India scrapped Facebook’s ‘Free Basic’ campaign, a zero rating platform supposedly designed to boost internet connectivity in emerging markets like India.

It’s now been a total of hundred days for Bedi as MD of the second-largest market for Facebook with a total user base of 166 million monthly active users. Umang Bedi says, “It’s been a fascinating journey I think I have learnt more than ever, I think I have traveled more than ever. My journey can be broken down into three parts, large amount of effort and time spent with our large advertisers and our agency partners, second part has been really about understanding the business, and third part - focused on our teams and putting together our vision and strategy for long time growth and sustainability.”

And in this short journey so far Umang already realizes how fast Facebook moves reason why Facebook has made huge strides in India lapping up 85 million daily active users, Facebook is now available in 12 Indian languages and India is the largest country for developers building with Facebook outside the US. And with no luck trying to enter China since 2009, India becomes the most critical and strategic market for the social networking site, also making it imperative for Facebook to thrive in India and no one knows this more than Bedi.

Umang Bedi has already outlined the main priorities for Facebook India, first and foremost, deep vertical focus, he wants to focus across the top eight verticals at Facebook that includes E-commerce, Retail, Travel, FMCG, Financial services, Tech, Telecom and Auto. Bedi intends to work across Facebook’s top 200 brands helping them grow their business in order to make Facebook a major part of their core strategy and most importantly at this point the social networking giant wants to befriend brands and send the message across to everyone that “Facebook moves Business”.