Razmig Hovaghimian, founder of Viki, steps down as CEO, to lead Rakuten’s global video strategy

Looks like Razmig Hovaghimian, the co-founder of the multilingual “video wikipedia” Viki is no longer the CEO of the company. Re/code first reported the news. Speaking with Tech in Asia, Hovaghimian confirms that this is his decision.

The change comes just one year and five months after Japan’s Rakuten acquired Viki for a rumored US$200 million. At the time, Viki was partly based in Singapore, making it one of the largest exits ever for a Southeast Asian company. The community was excited and Hovaghimian’s story became an inspiration to many entrepreneurs.

According to Re/code, Hovaghimian will be staying on at Rakuten as an entrepreneur in residence as well as retaining the title “head of video.” Hovaghimian further confirmed that Tammy Nam, the chief marketing officer of Viki will take over his spot while he retains his executive chairman title.

A new path

Just last October, Tech in Asia sat down with Hovaghimian to talk about Rakuten, his role there, and the future of Viki. With Viki’s user base growing rapidly, new products, on the horizon, and Hovaghimian firmly installed in Rakuten’s hierarchy as a senior executive officer and board observer, the present – and future – seemed bright. Hovaghimian had avoided the fate of Rakuten’s other overseas acquisitions – slumping performance and changing of the guard in senior management.

Hovaghimian told us in October that in the year following the acquisition, it went from about 22 million monthly active users with 10 million on mobile to 35 million monthly active users and 25 million mobile users. Speaking today, he says that mobile is growing at a rate of 1 million users a month, and is now up to 28 million.

This growth is not confined to Asia. Latin America and the European Union make up 40 percent of traffic, up from around 15 to 20 percent at the time of acquisition. Following Rakuten’s guidance, revenue figures are not disclosed.

That upward trend has not abated and now Hovaghimian will concentrate on Rakuten’s global video operations. Is this a case of restructuring and appeasement via inflated titles? Hovaghimian says nothing could be further from the truth:

“Viki is growing much faster than before. The business is thriving across every metric, Rakuten synergies included. The team will crush, and I’m staying on as executive chairman. Not only am I helping shape the video strategy, but also staying on as a senior executive and board observer at Rakuten, with flexibility on what next. Working very closely with [Hiroshi Mikitani, Rakuten CEO]. We’re just getting started.

Hovaghimian has successfully dodged the pitfalls that have plagued many CEOs in cross-border acquisitions. His experiences with Japanese advertising heavyweight Dentsu and American media giant NBC Universal, along with his vision and charisma, make him set up to successfully play the game of thrones required for survival at a large conglomerate. Considering he became the first CEO of an a non-Japanese acquired company to become a board observer and gained the global-spanning head of video title, it could be said he is winning the game. Now, he’s making his next move.

Editor’s note: The author is a former employee of Rakuten, Inc. in Tokyo. Please see our Statement of Ethics for further details.