Jo Yan entered the entertainment business in 1989 after graduating from university in the UK, when he landed a job as an internal censor for a HK television station. Moving into the film industry in 1990 when he joined the Asia regional office of the US studio Orion Pictures International, he was exposed to the theatrical business from a regional perspective. After spending two years with Orion, he went on to work for Intercontinental Film Distributors Ltd, a leading local film distributor in Hong Kong, for 2 years before being hired by Buena Vista International (BVI) in Oct 1994. Jo was hired at a time when BVI, a fully owned subsidiary of the Walt Disney Studios, was terminating a worldwide sub-distribution relationship with Warner Bros as it sought to establish its own distribution network around the world.

As one of the first BVI employees in Asia Pacific, Jo has been involved in building its presence across the region, including new offices in Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, China. As Head of Sales in the Asia Pacific Region, his chief responsibilities not only included overseeing all sales related issues and film operations in the region, but also included special responsibilities to look after India and China, as well as developing markets such as Vietnam and Bangledesh etc.

Today, as Senior Vice President of Sales, Acquisitions and Co-Productions for Walt Disney Studio Motion Pictures Asia Pacific (WDSMPAP), in addition to his Sales responsibilities, Jo has been given the task to create Chinese language film contents through co-producing Disney-brandable films with local talents for Greater China, Asia and beyond. Besides, Jo is also actively looking to acquire locally produced Chinese language films to feed the distribution network of WDSMPAP offices in the region.