MUMBAI: Raghav Bahl's Television Eighteen Group has fused all its marketing and sales operations under a new division TV18 Media Networks. The group has promoted its VP sales and marketing B Saikumar as CEO of the division.

Speaking on the rationale behind the move, TV18 CEO Haresh Chawla said, "TV18, today stands as the largest news network with four news channels. It is merely to consolidate all the sales and marketing activities."

When quizzed if the group was adopting a similar model to that of NDTV Ltd's subsidiary NDTV Media (which manages the company's ad sales and marketing), Saikumar said, "This is a division and very much part of the group. We are involved in activities of designing promos besides sales and marketing." He declined to comment any further on the matter.

As CEO of TV18 Media Networks, Saikumar will have all the heads of sales and marketing from various channels of the news network - English business news channel CNBC TV18, Hindi consumer channel Awaaz, English news channel CNN-IBN and Hindi news channel Channel7 (soon to be re-named as IBN7) reporting in to him. Saikumar, meanwhile, continues to report in to Chawla.