Warner Bros. Restructuring Results In Departure Of Marketing Executive
The executive landscape at Warner Bros. continues to change as the company continues to restructure and refocus on its streaming service in the face of the global coronavirus pandemic.
Variety reports that the Warner Bros. co-president of worldwide marketing, JP Richards, is now leaving the studio after working with the company for five years. According to WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar, the move is part of the company’s efforts to trim its workforce.
Kilar sent out a memo to the company revealing that up to seven percent of the WarnerMedia workforce would be let go. That would mean thousands of workers would be relieved of their jobs in the middle of a pandemic. WarnerMedia had also recently let go of 600 workers back in August.
Before his time with Warner Bros., Deadline says that Richards had spent 12 years at Universal, rising to the rank of senior vice president of digital marketing.
Once Richard moved to Warner Bros., he first took on the role of executive vice president of worldwide digital marketing. He was eventually promoted to executive vice president of worldwide marketing as well as a chief digital strategist.
During his time with Warner Bros., Richard has worked on the marketing of the films A Star Is Born, Joker, Mad Max: Fury Road, Crazy Rich Asians, They Shall Not Grow Old, and Aquaman.
Richard’s departure is the latest change in the WarnerMedia executive structure. A few weeks ago, Channing Dungey was named the next chairman of Warner Bros. Television, succeeding Peter Roth.
Dungey, who was previously the vice president of Netflix's originals, is expected to grow WarnerMedia’s recently launched streaming service, HBO Max. During her time with Netflix, Dungey was able to usher in series like Away starring Hillary Swank, the limited series Self Made: Inspired by the Life of Madam CJ Walker, and the upcoming Shonda Rimes series Bridgerton.
Other media companies are also doing similar maneuvering, with NBCUniversal installing Susan Rovner as its entertainment programming division head and Pearlena Igbokwe as its new television content chief.
Over at Netflix, Bela Bajaria was promoted to head of global television. Bajaria, for her part, has also shaken up the Netflix executive structure, promoting four names to handle Netflix’s new streamlined departments.
On the marketing side, Netflix recently hired Bozoma Saint John as its new chief marketing officer.
These media companies’ moves to strengthen their streaming departments is understandable, as it looks like streaming services will continue to be the preferred medium of entertainment as the global coronavirus pandemic continues to rage on.
As of the Nov. 11 update from the World Health Organization, there are currently 51,251,715 people who are confirmed to have COVID-19. The number of people that have died from COVID-19 is now at 1,270,930.