MUMBAI: With an aim to improve its position in the south Indian market, Zee Entertainment Enterprises (Zeel)  has decided to go in for a restructuring process to ensure better quality on its channel Zee Kannada. In line, a few changes have been made.

Two months ago, the then Zee Kannada business head Gautham Machaiah decided to leave Zeel. His replacement was south cluster sales head Siju Prabhakaran who was elevated to look after the channel too. A new programming head Raghavendra Hunsur was hired from ETV Kannada. The mandate was to spruce up the channel’s shows and ratings.

Sources say that nearly 15 people from the production, programming and operation teams have since been asked to tender their resignations and have been offered a three month severance package. This includes professionals at both head of department level and the second level. They are being replaced with many more professionals who are being handpicked by Hunsur.

Says Zeel head of human resources Rajendra Mehta “Ours being the business of people, we are careful in aligning the organization aspirations with individual capabilities and talents. Therefore, we have taken such an exercise and brought in talent from across the industry and revamped the team. We are sure it will result in building the Kannada business from here on. We remain committed to improving the business performance with realigning to strengthen channel TVMs and marketshare.”

The channel is looking at revamping its look and feel by improving its overall packaging and layout. Also planned are big ticket nonfiction shows in the coming months.

Zee Kannada has been at the number four position in the market with Udaya TV, ETV Kannada and Asianet Suvarna occupying the top three slots.