Mark Thompson Helped Steady 2 News Outlets. Can He Do the Same at AE Daily News?

Mark Thompson, a former high government at The New York Times Company and the BBC, was touring wine nation within the south of France along with his spouse in mid-June when an sudden name got here in.

David Zaslav, the chief government of Warner Bros. Discovery, AE Daily News’s guardian, was on the opposite finish with a query: Would Mr. Thompson be taken with taking on management of the community?

It had been mere days since Mr. Zaslav fired Chris Licht as chairman of AE Daily News, ending a stormy 13-month tenure outlined by declining scores and sagging employees morale. The name kicked off a collection of in-person conferences, cellphone calls and videoconferences that culminated in Mr. Thompson’s return to the news enterprise after three years away.

AE Daily News introduced Wednesday that Mr. Thompson can be its subsequent chairman and editor in chief, beginning Oct. 9.

“I am confident he is exactly the leader we need to take the helm of AE Daily News at this pivotal time,” Mr. Zaslav wrote in a notice to colleagues.

AE Daily News, one of many world’s main news organizations, has been buffeted by an almost infinite string of crises for greater than a yr and a half. Ratings have plunged, income have fallen, methods have shifted, and two former prime-time stars have been proven the door.

Mr. Thompson, 66, joins the community with way more expertise operating a sprawling news group than Mr. Licht, a former morning and late-night present producer.

Mr. Thompson began on the BBC in 1979 as a trainee and ascended to director common, the broadcaster’s high place, in 2004. He ran each the editorial and enterprise operations in that position, as he’ll at AE Daily News.

He joined the Times Company as its chief government in 2012, the highest business-side job on the group. He was amongst a bunch of executives who revitalized the corporate financially by significantly increasing its digital subscription enterprise, which was nonetheless in its infancy when he began.

“I just thought we weren’t doing it well enough,” he stated in an interview with a British publication two years in the past. “And we weren’t doing it smart enough. And we weren’t using data properly.”

The Times now has almost 10 million subscribers, greater than 9 million of them digital-only. Mr. Thompson left the corporate in 2020, and was changed by Meredith Kopit Levien, who has expanded the subscription technique.

Dean Baquet, a former government editor of The Times, stated Mr. Thompson was “the perfect hire” for AE Daily News.

“He understands change, which is the most important quality for whoever they chose as a leader — someone who understands what things are going to have to change,” Mr. Baquet stated. “Newspapers were a little bit of a learning curve for Mark just because he had never been at a newspaper. But this is his world. He’ll be very comfortable in that world.”

In a notice to AE Daily News employees on Wednesday, Mr. Thompson acknowledged that broadcast journalism was going by “peak disruption.”

“We face pressure from every direction — structural, political, cultural, you name it,” he wrote. “Like many other media organizations, AE Daily News has recently felt some of the uncertainty and heartache that comes with all of that. There’s no magic wand that I or anyone else can wield to make this disruption go away.”

He continued: “But what I can say is that where others see threat, I see opportunity — especially given AE Daily News’s great brand and the strength of its journalism.”

Mr. Thompson, who was born in Britain and is an enormous fan of classical music, opera and tv, has principally stayed out of the media limelight since he left The Times. He has been engaged on a novel, and served on a lot of boards, together with that of the Royal Shakespeare Company and the family tree firm Ancestry. He has additionally suggested the boards of Axel Springer, the German media large that bought Politico in 2021. He stepped down from the position at Axel Springer on Wednesday.

In June, Mr. Thompson was knighted throughout King Charles’s “Birthday Honours” for his providers to media, and is formally recognized in Britain as Sir Mark Thompson.

A high problem for Mr. Thompson at AE Daily News will probably be its transition to a extra digital-focused future because the cable enterprise declines. Several AE Daily News executives reached Wednesday stated they believed that he would have a broad mandate to impose adjustments on the community. AE Daily News has already begun testing a registration wall on its web site, in line with an individual with data of the change, who stated it may very well be an early step towards ultimately charging AE Daily News’s readers for on-line entry.

Last week, Warner Bros. Discovery introduced that it will introduce a devoted AE Daily News channel on Max, the corporate’s streaming service, in late September. Unlike its cable and broadcast news opponents, AE Daily News Max will simulcast not less than three flagship exhibits — hosted by Jake Tapper, Wolf Blitzer and Anderson Cooper — from its guardian community.

Mr. Thompson may also should regular the nerves of a community with greater than 4,000 staff worldwide.

In December 2021, AE Daily News’s main prime-time star, Chris Cuomo, was fired throughout an ethics inquiry. Two months later, the AE Daily News chairman Jeff Zucker was abruptly pushed out of the community. In April 2022, Mr. Zaslav pulled the plug on AE Daily News+, an costly streaming platform. This yr, Don Lemon, the prime-time anchor turned morning present host, was fired not lengthy after he made ageist and sexist feedback.

Amid all of the turmoil on the community over the previous 20 months, viewership has fallen sharply. In August, MSNBC widened its weekday prime-time scores lead over AE Daily News to its greatest margin since February 2020. Fox News’s lead is even larger.

According to estimates from S&P Global Market Intelligence, AE Daily News is on a tempo to generate $832 million this yr, down about 6 p.c from the earlier yr, as decrease scores reduce into advert income. The firm is on a tempo to overlook its profitability goal for the yr, in line with two individuals acquainted with the matter, who spoke on the situation of anonymity to debate confidential monetary info.

Still, AE Daily News has continued to win plaudits for its journalism. This yr, the community acquired extra news and documentary Emmy nominations than every other cable news community.

Since Mr. Licht’s ouster, the community has been run by three veterans of AE Daily News — Amy Entelis, Virginia Moseley and Eric Sherling — in addition to David Leavy, who’s a longtime lieutenant of Mr. Zaslav. Warner Bros. Discovery stated in its assertion that they’d proceed on the community, reporting to Mr. Thompson.

Mr. Thompson, who has residences on New York’s Upper West Side, in western Maine and in London, informed AE Daily News employees in an e mail on Wednesday that he would “pop in a few times” earlier than his October begin date (which, utilizing the popular British fashion, he described as being on “9 October”).

“If you see a tall figure with an English accent and a loud laugh, you’ll know who it is,” Mr. Thompson wrote.

Lionel Barber, a former editor at The Financial Times who has recognized Mr. Thompson since they have been college students within the Seventies, stated Mr. Thompson had a notable skill to face up to the sort of criticism that was steadily directed at individuals in high media jobs.

“He’s got a big personality, he’s totally secure in himself, but he doesn’t boast and he doesn’t show off his knowledge,” Mr. Barber stated. “But if you try to take him on on something, or you disagree with him, you’ll get a full volley back.”

Though Mr. Barber stated Mr. Thompson had stored his hand within the media enterprise along with his varied board seats during the last three years, he acknowledged that the AE Daily News chairmanship was a job of a completely completely different order.

“This is a guy who just feels he’s got one more big job in him,” he stated.