Nine MD Amanda Laing revamps corporate strategy team
Nine Entertainment Co MD Amanda Laing has assembled a new corporate strategy team, poaching senior executives.
Nine Entertainment Co managing director Amanda Laing has assembled a new corporate strategy team, poaching senior executives from the US and the company’s half-owned streaming service Stan.
Ms Laing was elevated to the MD role in November, as revealed by The Australian, after previously serving as group general counsel and commercial director.
Nine has lured Zsofi Paterson from US media group Vessel where she was head of content acquisition, along with Stan’s content acquisition manager Alison Hurbert-Burns.
“We are looking to beef up business development and commercial development at Nine reporting into me,” Ms Laing told The Australian in her first interview since being appointed MD, which effectively made her new chief executive Hugh Marks’ No 2.
“We haven’t formalised a departmental name yet but the team will be responsible for growing revenue from content-driven initiatives, sports rights exploitation and strategy management.”
Ms Paterson was previously a corporate lawyer at DLA Piper Australia and was ready to return to the country for the “right role”, Ms Laing said.
Nine executive producer of sport Matt Callander will also report to Ms Laing as head of commercial development for sports, in addition to his duties reporting to director of sport Tom Malone.
Nine is focused on maximising the value of its content and sports rights, after agreeing to fork out $625 million to the National Rugby League last year.
The network agreed to simulcast its games with subscription television service Fox Sports, owned by The Australian’s publisher News Corporation, for the first time, resulting in a hit to Nine’s ratings this year.
Fox Sports agreed to pay Nine $20 million a year to simulcast the games until the new broadcast deal ends in 2022.
Asked if Nine’s audience losses were likely to cost the network more than $20m a year, Ms Laing said: “I don’t think so.
“We knew there would be some impact on the audiences but we have eight minutes of advertising that gets shown in the Fox Sports broadcast and we’ve got the best coverage and we’re very comfortable with the decision made and the outcome.
“At the end of the season we’ll review it … we assess it every week obviously, but as we sit here today we’re very comfortable with where we’re at.”
Ms Laing refused to be drawn on the network’s 60 Minutes botched child snatch attempt but said she was “of course” relieved that the crew, led by reporter Tara Brown, had returned safely to Australia.
The new hires at Nine come after the departure of the company’s former head of strategy Melanie Kansil in January.
Alexi Baker, who had worked closely with Ms Kansil, has been appointed Nine strategy and corporate development director, but she reports to chief digital and marketing officer Alex Parsons.
“We will all be working closely with Alexi,” Ms Laing said.
“I think it’s a great team with different and complementary skills.”
Ms Laing said the raft of women in senior positions at Nine dispelled any notion that the network was a “boys club”.
“There are a lot of fantastic smart senior women here at Nine.”
One trend she can’t deny is the growing influence of lawyers at Nine, starting with herself and chief executive Hugh Marks. Then there is Paterson and group general counsel Rachel Launders.
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