Sandhya Devanathan, Meta’s vice president for India and Southeast Asia, is leaving the social media company to join OpenAI, TechCrunch reports. OpenAI told the outlet that Devanathan will be based in Singapore and report to Kiran Mani, the company’s Asia-Pacific managing director. Her new remit spans consumer growth, enterprise adoption, partnerships, regulatory engagement and operations across Southeast Asia and Australia, according to TechCrunch. That makes the hire less about a single-country posting and more about OpenAI assigning senior operating capacity across several Asia-Pacific markets at once. The move comes shortly after another regional OpenAI appointment. TechCrunch reports that Prabhjeet Singh joined the company days earlier as its India head, after more than a decade at Uber, where he led the India and South Asia business. OpenAI has been expanding its presence across Asia Pacific, according to the report, opening offices in Singapore, Tokyo, Seoul, Sydney and Delhi over the past two years. Devanathan’s role sits inside that expansion: consumer distribution, enterprise adoption and regulatory engagement are all functions tied to sustained market operations. For Meta, the departure removes a senior regional executive. TechCrunch reports that Devanathan joined Meta in 2016, previously led its Asia-Pacific gaming business, and was appointed vice president for India and Southeast Asia in June last year. TechCrunch also reports that, following her exit, Meta India managing director Arun Srinivas will report directly to Benjamin Joe, Meta’s vice president for Asia-Pacific, citing a person familiar with the matter. The same person told the outlet that Devanathan had been involved in the company’s decision process in India. Separately, TechCrunch says Meta has been under growing scrutiny in India over issues including online safety and content moderation. The outlet notes that Indian authorities recently summoned Meta executives, including chief global affairs officer Joel Kaplan, after Instagram mistakenly restricted a post by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in July; Meta later apologized for the error. New Delhi has also raised questions about child sexual abuse material on Meta’s platforms, according to TechCrunch. The outlet reports that the Indian government sought an explanation after a BBC report found Instagram advertisements that allegedly offered access to such content. Meta’s response, as described by TechCrunch, was that it had removed violating ads and accounts and rejected suggestions that it knowingly targeted those ads at users based on inappropriate interests. The company also said it removed 160,000 accounts in India over six months based on signals indicating child-exploitative activity. Who benefits: OpenAI gains a senior operator with experience at Meta across India and Southeast Asia. Devanathan steps into a role with direct responsibility for several commercial and regulatory functions in Asia-Pacific. Who's exposed: Meta loses a senior regional executive while, according to TechCrunch, facing scrutiny in India over content moderation and online-safety issues. Its India managing director, Arun Srinivas, will now report directly to Asia-Pacific vice president Benjamin Joe, according to TechCrunch’s source.