Sharad Devarajan

For Devarajan, Graphic India is the culmination of his lifelong dream to launch characters, heroes and stories that tap into the unique creativity and culture of India but appeal to audiences worldwide. In the same way the West has created superheroes or Japan launched anime, Graphic India is transforming the perception of India in animation from being an ‘outsourcer” to being ‘the source.’ Devarajan overseas all aspects of the business and has had nearly two decades of experience in the character entertainment industry.

Devarajan is the Co-Founder & Executive Chairman of Liquid Comics, an entertainment company that uses the medium of graphic novel storytelling to develop original content for various media platforms. Devarajan was previously the Co-Founder, CEO & Publisher of Virgin Comics LLC a company he co-founded, with Sir Richard Branson, authors Deepak Chopra, Gotham Chopra & filmmaker Shekhar Kapur.

Devarajan is also a Producer / Executive Producer on a number of theatrical live-action film and television projects in development including The Leaves with Summit Entertainment; Ramayan 3392AD with Mandalay Entertainment; The Sadhu with producer Mark Canton (‘300’ ‘Immortals’); Dominion: Dinosaurs Versus Aliens with filmmaker Barry Sonnenfeld (‘Men in Black’ trilogy); Coming of Rage, with filmmaker Wes Craven (‘Scream’); Gamekeeper, with filmmaker Guy Ritchie (‘Sherlock Holmes’); and Marked, with Emmy-Award Winning writer James Manos Jr. (Sopranos, Dexter); Devarajan also worked with filmmaker John Woo (Mission Impossible 2; Face Off) as Executive Producer on the animated web series, “John Woo Presents: 7 Brothers.

In 2010, Mr. Devarajan led a project with the Open Hands Initiative, to bring together a group of American and Middle Eastern students with disabilities to work together and create a new superhero that reflected their shared challenges & values. The superhero, “Silver Scorpion,” received worldwide acclaim for promoting advocacy for the rights of people with disabilities in the Middle East. President Clinton honored the students at the Clinton Global Initiative, stating that the comic book “will help to establish trust and understanding between cultures, to empower young people with disabilities.”

In 2004, Mr. Devarajan worked with Marvel as the creator of a new reinvention of Spider-Man as an Indian boy growing up in Mumbai, transforming “Peter Parker” into “Pavitr Prabhakar”. Unlike traditional translations of western characters into foreign markets, the new series, “Spider-Man: India” was heralded as one of the industry’s first “trans-creations.”

For his activities, Mr. Devarajan was featured as CNNfn’s ‘Maverick in The Morning’ and covered in numerous media including WSJ, Time, Newsweek, New York Times, Fox News, CNN, and NPR’s Fresh Air. He has been a speaker at various events including, TEDX Gateway, Fortune Magazine’s Global Forum, FICCI, and Harvard Business School.He holds a BFA from Syracuse University and an MBA from Columbia University where he is an Adjunct Professor at Columbia Business School teaching, Media Marketing and Entrepreneurship; Transmedia & Transcreation; and Just Capital & Cause Driven Marketing.