Media industry moves
*Rich Battista will now lead all of TimeInc.'s U.S. brands as executive vice president of Time Inc. andpresident of brands, according to a July 13 news release. The move is part of abroad reorganizationof the company, pursuant to which Alan Murray will succeed Norman Pearlstine asTime Inc.'s chief content officer. Pearlstine will remain with the company asvice chairman. Murray will continue to serve as the editor of Fortune until hissuccessor is named. Moreover, Time Inc.'s U.S. advertising sales organizationwill now report to chief revenue officer of global advertising, Mark Ford. JenWong, president of digital, will lead the company's creative studio, TheFoundry. Meanwhile, Executive Vice President Evelyn Webster is leaving thecompany.
*Google Inc.hired the team behindKifi, a deep search engine that allowsusers to organize and share web content. The Kifi team will join the unit's Spaces teamto "build solutions focused on improving group sharing, conversation, and contentfinding," according to a July 12 post on the official Kifi blog.
*Google's self-driving car project namedKen Vosen as its first general counsel, Reuters reported July 11. Theappointment of a general counsel could be a sign that the Alphabet unit ispreparing to make its self-driving car business a separate company. Google alsoappointed Tim Papandreou to work on partnerships.
*Microsoft Corp.confirmed that itwill shutter its mobile phone subsidiary in Finland, as well as slash 1,350jobs in the country, Reuters reported July 11. The job cuts are part ofMicrosoft's plans to streamline its smartphone business by slashing 1,850positions worldwide.
*EBay Inc. willacquire SalesPredict, an Israeli firm that usesadvanced analytics to predict customer buying behavior and sales conversion.The online auctioneer said July 11 that the deal will support its artificialintelligence, machine learning and data science efforts. Post-transaction,several SalesPredict employees will join eBay's structured data organizationand work in eBay's existing development center in Netanya, led by YuvalMatalon. SalesPredict CEO Yaron Zakai-Or will serve as a director of productmanagement, technology, while SalesPredict CTO Kira Radinsky will be directorof data science and chief scientist at eBay Israel.
*Starz Alison Hoffman to thenewly created position of chief marketing officer. Hoffman recently served asthe company's executive vice president of marketing. Previously, she was vicepresident of creative and brand strategy at AMC Networks Inc.
*Google acquired Anvato Inc., a video streaming andmonetization platform, according to a July 7 official blog post. Anvato willjoin theAlphabet unit's Google Cloud Platform team. Anvato's Media Content Platformwill complement Google's efforts to enable scalable media processing andworkflows in the cloud.
*Univision Communications Inc.said July 7 that it addedto Isaac Lee's list of responsibilities at the company. Lee, who served aschief news and digital officer at the company as well as head of Fusion MediaGroup, has been promoted to the newly created position of chief news, entertainmentand digital officer. Univision is searching for a new president ofentertainment who will report to Lee.
*Citadel LLC appointedB. Kevin Turner as vice chairman of the company and CEO of Citadel SecuritiesLLC, according to a July 7 news release. Turner will join Citadel Securitiesafter a short transition period from Microsoft, where he served as COO.
Communications industry moves
*Comcast Corp. isreshuffling itsexecutives in the technology and operations management, Multichannel Newsreported July 13, citing people with insider knowledge. Executive vicepresident of sales and marketing operations, Greg Butz, will become thepresident of Comcast Mobile. He will be replaced by Rick Lang, senior vicepresident marketing and sales of Comcast's Central Division. Executive VicePresident and Cable CFO Cathy Avgiris will become interim global risk officer.Steve Croney, senior vice president of financial planning, will succeed her asthe CFO. Executive Vice President and Chief Network Officer John Schanz will bemoving to investment fund Atairos in an advisory role. Tony Werner, presidentof technology and product, and Marcien Jenckes, executive vice president ofconsumer services, will take on Schanz's responsibilities.
*FairPoint Communications Inc.said July 13 that it promoted Karen Turner to CFO of the company. Turner,formerly the company's executive vice president of operational support,succeeds Ajay Sabherwal, who is leavingthe company to pursue other business opportunities.
*Charter Communications Inc.on July 11 named MikeBair executive vice president of Spectrum Networks, which includes oversight ofthe company's regional sports networks in Los Angeles. Bair previously was theCEO of Bleachers Corp., a streaming media company. Additionally, CliffordHarris was appointed senior vice president of law for programming, product andregulatory. He previously served as senior vice president and associate generalcounsel for cable at Altice NVunit Cablevision Systems Corp.
*Former YouTube executive Ivana Kirkbride joined VerizonCommunications Inc. as chief content officer for its Go90 streamingservice, Recode reported July 8. Recently, Kirkbride served as vice presidentof content acquisition at video startup Vessel.