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Industry Moves: MySpace ODs On New Execs; Oberfest Leaves LAT To Join
MySpace had a brief flurry of activity this afternoon, when reports came out that it had done some trimming of its staff. Turns out it was a yearly review thing, and some non-performing employees were let go, and new ones are being hired in their place.
Separate from that, the company has announced a slew of new senior execs at the social network, many of them familiar names in our industry:
-- Manu Thapar, SVP of Engineering. He was previously the VP of Engineering for Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO), where he was responsible for software infrastructure engineering and ops.
-- Angela Courtin, SVP of Marketing. She was previously at MTV Networks (NYSE: VIA), as VP of Integrated Marketing, responsible for overseeing the West Coast department. At MySpace, she fills in the role that Shawn Gold held until last year.
-- Tish Whitcraft, SVP of Customer Care. Also ex-Yahoo, but her most recent role was VP of Global Customer Experience and Operations at ooma, the consumer Voip start-up.
-- Jason Oberfest, VP of Business Development. Prior to this he was Managing Director of Business Development and Product Management for Los Angeles Times Interactive. Effectively the business head of LATimes.com...will find out who the new head is.
-- Abe Thomas, VP of Online Marketing. Prior to MySpace, Abe was at eBay (NSDQ: EBAY) and PayPal.
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Industry Moves: MySpace ODs On New Execs; Oberfest Leaves LAT To Join
MySpace had a brief flurry of activity this afternoon, when reports came out that it had done some trimming of its staff. Turns out it was a yearly review thing, and some non-performing employees were let go, and new ones are being hired in their place.
Separate from that, the company has announced a slew of new senior execs at the social network, many of them familiar names in our industry:
-- Manu Thapar, SVP of Engineering. He was previously the VP of Engineering for Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO), where he was responsible for software infrastructure engineering and ops.
-- Angela Courtin, SVP of Marketing. She was previously at MTV Networks (NYSE: VIA), as VP of Integrated Marketing, responsible for overseeing the West Coast department. At MySpace, she fills in the role that Shawn Gold held until last year.
-- Tish Whitcraft, SVP of Customer Care. Also ex-Yahoo, but her most recent role was VP of Global Customer Experience and Operations at ooma, the consumer Voip start-up.
-- Jason Oberfest, VP of Business Development. Prior to this he was Managing Director of Business Development and Product Management for Los Angeles Times Interactive. Effectively the business head of LATimes.com...will find out who the new head is.
-- Abe Thomas, VP of Online Marketing. Prior to MySpace, Abe was at eBay (NSDQ: EBAY) and PayPal.
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Industry Moves: Changes At FIM's Scout: SVP Patrick Crumb Leaves For Liberty Media; Husvar New GM
Patrick Crumb, the SVP at Fox Interactive Media (NYSE: NWS), and GM of sports site network Scout Media, which FIM bought in 2005, has left the company, and is joining Liberty Sports Group, the newly formed subsidiary of Liberty Media (NSDQ: LINTA). He is joining as EVP of Business Affairs and General Counsel. Crumb had worked with Scout since 2001 and had served as Scout's President & General Counsel, a member of its board of directors and an investor. In his new role, Crumb will be responsible for leading the group's efforts in growth and expansion across all existing properties while seeking out new business ventures locally and nationally, it said.
Liberty Sports currently consists of three regional sports networks in Denver, Pittsburgh and Seattle....Crumb is based in Seattle.
Update: Effective July 1, Crumb's replacement at FIM is Jeff Husvar, promoted to SVP-Operations of Fox Sports Interactive from VP-business operations, and now adding the title of Scout GM. He has also been GM of WhatifSports.com. He'll oversee all strategy, operations and production for Scout's online and publishing businesses, according to an internal memo from Brian Grey, SVP and GM of Fox Sports Interactive. Husvar remains based in LA but will ratchet up his time in Seattle, where Scott is based.
Husvar, who joined FSI from CBS (NYSE: CBS) Sportsline, has been involved in the ongoing integration of Scout into FSI.
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FIM Reorganizes: Barrett Out; Bain President Of New FIM Audience Network
Major changes at Fox Interactive Media (NYSE: NWS), all centered on money ... Michael Barrett is leaving rather than change roles after his job of chief revenue officer was eliminated in a reorganization of advertising operations and sales. FIM is decentralizing sales and moving the branded sales teams into the units they support—IGN, Photobucket, sports, etc.
At the same time, FIM is spinning ad operations, performance sales, its new hypertargeting and more into the FIM Audience Network—a monetization technology business unit with its own P&L and FIM veteran Adam Bain as president. Bain's charter is to not only serve FIM clients but third parties as well, something already underway. He will report to FIM president Peter Levinsohn; the new unit includes at its core interactive ad tech company Strategic Data Corp. (SDC) acquired early last year.
According to sources familiar with the situation, the decision to create the new unit resulted in the shift for Barrett, who declined the offer of another job and will be a consultant during a two-month transition. The move was described as "furthering strengths" and "empowering Adam's group to go out and build a business."
FIM was scrambling to get the news of the moves to its own employees after a report by TechCrunch tonight and declined comment. TechCrunch also reported that FIM expects to miss a revenue target of $1 billion during this fiscal year ending June 30.
This is a little tricky because $1 billion was an amount News Corp chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch offered as a highest possibility—complete with 20 percent margins—but the way he put it was he wouldn't be surprised if it happened that way. It's not clear that it was an actual internal target—or the bluest-sky possibility raising expectations and pressure. Either way, FIM is likely to make $900 million in revenue for the News Corp fiscal year and Murdoch's surprise may come from not being able to brag about FIM's first $1 billion year (although $900 million would have been considered a victory before those comments). The company reported $233 million total revenue for FYQ2, up 87 percent, with operating profit of $47 million compared to an $11 million loss the previous year. Ad revenue rose 43 percent, year over year, and 31 percent sequentially.
Update: I mentioned one explanation for the moves above. Another version has MySpace CEO Chris DeWolfe at the center—suggesting that his desire for control over MySpace sales and friction with Barrett led to moving branded sales to the brands themselves. Barrett's job was all about the brands and his FIM deal gave him an out if his responsibilities changed. At MySpace, this puts Jeff Berman, EVP-marketing and content, in the lead sales role, and, it puts DeWolfe center stage on delivering.
Beyond that, FIM is likely to see a batch of departures on the sales side if Barrett's peeps follow him out. Finding good internet sales jobs these days is a lot easier than finding good sales people.
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MySpace SVP of Marketing & Content Shawn Gold Leaving
Shawn Gold, the SVP of Marketing and Content Development at MySpace, is leaving, paidContent.org has learned, and Gold has confirmed it to us. Not sure where he is going, and he still has three weeks left at MySpace, but he recently registered SocialApproach.com, so that might give you a hint. Gold joined MySpace in February 2006...prior to that he was an SVP with Weblogs Inc, which was sold to AOL. Before that, among other things, he was president of eUniverse back in the days, later known as Intermix (and the company that owned MySpace prior to its sale).
At MySpace, Gold was the public face of the company to agencies and brands to convince them to use MySpace as their marketing and promotional vehicle. Not sure who the replacement at MySpace will be when he leaves...will let you know when we find out.
Industry Moves: Kennedy New EVP-Strategy And Corporate Development, FIM
Fox Interactive Media has appointed Jack Kennedy to the new post of EVP-Strategy and Corporate Development. Kennedy is moving over from Fox Network Group, where he managed corporate development for the cross-company business development group. He was involved in forming the NewSite JV. Reporting to Peter Levinsohn, he will be involved in shaping strategy as well as managing M&A and biz dev. His resume includes Teledesic, online video site Load Media Network and VC Indanta Partners.
Industry Moves Roundup: IGN; LATimes; Scripps; BermanBraun; Napster
-- Fox Interactive Media: FIM has appointed Charlie Barrett as SVP-sales for IGN Entertainment. He will head up sales for IGN.com, GameSpy, Direct2Drive, RottenTomatoes and AskMen, among others. Prior to this, Barrett was VP of sales for CNET Networks, where he managed Gamespot.com, TV.com and Webshots.com.
-- LAT Media Group: A "significant restructuring" of the advertising and marketing department's senior management teams. Changes include:
---- Tim Young joins as VP-sales development and innovation, charged with "repositioning advertising sales processes and behavior" to grow market share and revenue. Young most recently was a sales exec at TW Cable and before that was at AOL.
---- Marketing vet Douglas Trueblood joins as VP-integrated marketing responsible for marketing the LAT brands across platforms and developing incremental revenue opportunities. Trueblood comes from Billboard, where he was executive director-marketing and brand development; his resume includes Gannett, The Hollywood Reporter, buy.com and Universal Studios.
-- Scripps: Jody Jones is joining Scripps Networks Interactive as SVP, reporting to Interactive group president Deanna Brown. She will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of Scripps Networks' websites in the home, food and living categories. Prior to this, Jones served as VP and editorial director of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, where she was key in the re-building and re-launching of marthastewart.com.
-- Geraldine Martin-Coppola, till now Yahoo's director of media group strategy, has joined independent production venture BermanBraun, Gail Berman and Lloyd Braun's production company, as head of interactive. BermanBraun recently signed a deal with Pepsi Entertainment, which will get first dibs on any original online content produced by BermanBraun.
-- Napster has appointed Christopher Allen as new COO. Allen will be responsible for product strategy, development and marketing. Prior to this, he was Product Strategy, Design, and Marketing for Blockbuster Online. And previous to that he was VP of Product Strategy and Marketing at Yahoo! Music.
Industry Moves: Jeff King Moves From FIM to 19 Entertainment As U.S. New Media head
Jeff King, the head of American Idol's digital media efforts (formally VP & GM at Fox Interactive Media, Fox Branded Entertainment and Americanidol.com) has left and joined Simon Fuller's talent and production shop 19 Entertainment, as Head of Digital Entertainment, US. 19 is the company behind Pop Idol (American Idol here), so King was involved with 19 in his role at FIM prior to this. Also, Beckhams are managed by 19 as well, and the company produced the Victoria Beckham TV special on NBC recently.
At FIM's end, Don Wilcox has joined as Vice President, Fox Branded Entertainment, in the position King. Prior to this he was Executive Director, Marketing at Sony Pictures Digital.
