Annette Sharp: Ex-Nine CEO Hugh Marks takes on role at Tennis Australia

Former Nine boss Hugh Marks has taken on a consultancy role with Tennis Australia — whose coffers he helped fatten by a staggering $100 million, writes Annette Sharp.

Almost five months after handing in his security pass at media company Nine, former chief executive Hugh Marks has resurfaced in a consultancy role with the sports organisation whose coffers he helped fatten by a staggering $100 million.

That was the difference between Nine’s stunning five-year deal with Tennis Australia in 2019 and the previous bid from incumbent Seven Network, which had previously paid $33.5 million plus contra (represent­ing a package of $40 million) for just one year’s tennis rights.

Former Nine CEO Hugh Marks announced his new gig last week. Picture: Jane Dempster

As history has shown, Nine’s offer was too good for Tennis Australia to go past, representing, as it did, $60 million a year from Nine over Seven’s $40 million, although Tennis Australia’s balance sheet ultimately still reflects the punishing cost of Covid-19.

Having garnered himself some favour with the Tennis Australia board, Marks now finds himself in a position of having to replicate that windfall again and again in a role that will reportedly see him negotiating international broadcast deals for the organisation going forward.

It’s a gig that will at least give him something to do and help him break up his days wandering through Darlinghurst with his darling, former Nine executive Alexi Baker who, like Marks, has found employment post-Nine with one of Nine’s sports affiliates.

In her case it is the NRL, which looks to be paying top dollar for Baker.

Marks’s partner Alexi Baker is also working in the sports industry. Picture: Jane Dempster

Based on international sports company IMG’s rates, Marks is expected to take home a consultancy fee of around $100,000, which may be bolstered with a percentage fee of any international rights negotiated.

News of Marks’s new role dropped last week, just 48 hours ahead of Nine’s results being released to the market on Wednesday.

Those results, coming from Marks’s replacement Mike Sneesby, saw Nine’s share price plunge by 10 per cent.

Investors have lost confidence in the company’s future strategy of investing heavily in sport via Sneesby’s pet streaming project, Stan Sport.

Ironic?

Kerri-Anne Kennerley has sold her home for $22 million. Picture: Damian Shaw

KAK SELLS HER SPECIAL HOME

Having pocketed $22 million from the sale of her Woollahra house, Kerri-Anne Kennerley now faces the immense task of packing up the Victorian home that for a decade has conveniently backed onto Matt Moran’s Chiswick restaurant, aka “the cafeteria”.

It was in the former boarding house, bought in 1997 to accommodate husband John Kennerley’s growing model train collection, that the French champagne and tears flowed after her tenure on the Midday show was wound up in 1998.

Having shared the home for 19 years, before an accident left John hospitalised in 2016 and he died in 2019, Kennerley would care for her dying mother, Grace, at the home. She passed away in May.

NO FINE CHINA FOR ROXY

Roxy Jacenko and her husband Oliver Curtislook to have quietly shut their sideline venture 18 Communications, a business the pair launched in 2019 to “help Aussie businesses build a presence with the Australian-Chinese community” in China.

Roxy Jacenko and Oliver Curtis have shut their business 18 Communications. Picture: AAP Image

When unveiling the venture, Jacenko spruiked the burgeoning business, saying the platform would harness her husband’s “back-end and strategic ability” with her “creative comms ability”.

Curtis is the son of retired mining company boss Nick Curtis, who made his fortune setting up Sino Mining International under the state-owned China National Non Ferrous Metals Corporation.

Jacenko, who recently deleted the business from her social media account, didn’t respond to our Inquiry yesterday. Sources say staff attached to the venture have moved on to other agencies and the 18 Communications website been wiped.

Jacenko and Curtis started the business 18 months after Curtis’s release from jail on insider trading charges.

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