ITV has hired former BBC1 controller Peter Fincham to replace Simon Shaps as director of television. Fincham quit the BBC in the row over editing a programme trail in a misleading way. The company has also extended Michael Grade’s reign as executive chairman by an extra year to the end of 2010. Dawn Airey, the […]

Davide Rossi, chief of AEPOC, the anti-digital media piracy industry association, has denied allegations in the Italian press that he is implicated in smart card pirate ring. In recent days Rossi has been named in two Italian newspapers in connection with information acquired in raids in France, Poland, Greece and Sicily. The public prosecutor in […]

Eutelsat Communications has appointed former BT and Kingston employee Steve Maine as CEO of their jointly-owned venture offering Mobile Satellite Services (MSS) in S-Band. The Joint Venture, known under the name “Solaris”, will commercialise the first satellite infrastructure in Europe for broadcasting video, radio and data to mobile devices and vehicle receivers as well as […]

Jim Godfrey, ITV’s director of corporate affairs, is leaving in March after three years to set up his own PR agency. Godfrey, a former Labour special adviser, said he intended to specialise in political campaigns and branding with his new company, which will have ITV as its first client when it launches in July.

Virgin Media has appointed Alex Green as MD of its portal, responsible for accelerating growth of Virginmedia.com. Green takes on a new role within Virgin Media, which the media company says is unrelated to the departure of its director of portal Chris Bunyan, who leaves the company this week. Green will be charged with overseeing […]

ITV has appointed Patricia Wagstaff to the new post of director for digital productions. Wagstaff joins ITV Productions from the US cable network HBO. She has also worked as vice-president at the web video site iFilm.com. The new role will see her develop ITV content for new platforms and technologies, working as part of Dawn […]

Mark Hurd, the chairman and chief executive of Hewlett-Packard, has joined the board of News Corp. Hurd replaces Roderick Paige, the former US education secretary. Rupert Murdoch praised the HP boss's management skills. “Mark has had great success in sharpening HP's strategic focus resulting in increased growth and profitability for what is one of the […]

The president of MTV, Christina Norman, is stepping down after almost three years of trying to revitalise the cable channel and adding music and reality-based programming. Van Toffler, the president of the MTV Networks' Music and Logo Group, will assume Norman's day-to-day responsibilities for MTV.

Charlie Ergen, chairman of the board and CEO of DISH, has assumed the role of president. Ergen succeeds Carl Vogel, who stepped down as president due to personal reasons, the company said. Vogel will remain vice chairman of DISH Network and EchoStar, reporting to Ergen. Vogel continues to lead the corporate development, programming and business […]

Babelgum, has appointed BT Vision’s director of business affairs Mark Cranwell its first director of content strategy. Cranwell will report to Simon Kenny, head of content strategy and advertising at Babelgum. In his previous role, Cranwell was responsible for negotiating broadband video-on-demand deals.