Regional Managing Director — Streaming Portfolio

The mandate

This streaming portfolio serves audiences across the Americas through a mix of owned content, studio output, sports, local acquisitions and distribution partnerships. Several cornerstone rights packages approach renewal within the next planning cycle. Historic deals secured breadth and market entry, but new prices, windows, territorial carve-outs and direct-to-consumer strategies have changed their value. Renew everything and the cost base becomes untenable; lose the wrong rights and the service may break its audience promise.

The group is creating a Regional Managing Director role to own the integrated renewal and operating outcome. The executive will carry the Americas profit and loss, subscriber and advertising performance, regional content allocation, marketing, distribution, customer operations and country leadership. Global content and product teams retain their mandates, while business affairs controls contract execution. The Managing Director must bring regional audience, competitive and economic evidence into the rights decisions and then manage the customer consequence.

This urgent appointment is not restricted to negotiation. Rights value depends on proposition, price, placement, distribution and the alternatives available when a package changes. The board expects a leader who can walk away from prestige, invest behind underused rights when the service has failed to activate them, and communicate change without treating customers as passive recipients.

Scope and operating context

Based onsite in Los Angeles, the role influences approximately 950 employees and material partners across the United States and a wider international region. The perimeter includes country P&Ls, regional content, growth, pricing, advertising, partnerships, marketing, customer operations and planning. Major dependencies include global studio relationships, sports and acquisition teams, product, technology, finance, legal, rights management and distribution.

The Americas are not one market. Payment methods, broadband access, language, sports affinity, piracy, advertising maturity and willingness to pay differ. A package that drives weekly habit in one country may be a costly niche in another. Contract structures can force broad territorial purchase even when value is concentrated, making carve-outs, sublicensing or shared arrangements important.

Rights expiry creates operational risk. Titles and events must leave or change according to precise dates and territories; downloads, promotions, bundles and customer messaging must follow. Subscribers may have joined because of a specific promise. The Managing Director must ensure that commercial planning recognises those dependencies before the final negotiating position is set.

First-year agenda

The first seventy-five days will establish a renewal fact base for each material package. The team will connect rights scope, windows, territories, historical and forward cost, audience reach, acquisition, sustained viewing, cohort retention, advertising value, marketing dependence and alternative monetisation. Customer and portfolio effects will be separated from viewing that would likely transfer to other content.

The Managing Director will define a regional rights hierarchy. Foundation rights must support the core service promise across a meaningful audience. Differentiating rights should create acquisition, habit or pricing power unavailable elsewhere. Complementary rights may fill a targeted need efficiently. Opportunistic rights should remain flexible. The hierarchy will not predetermine a deal, but it will clarify where the region should tolerate price or structure and where it should not.

For each renewal, the executive will sponsor multiple operating scenarios: full retention, narrowed scope, shared rights, changed window, replacement slate and exit. Scenarios will include customer migration, marketing, product, advertising, distribution and cash, not merely the licence fee. Negotiators will enter discussions with walk-away conditions and executable alternatives.

Alternative supply will be developed before urgency peaks. Local acquisitions, co-productions, owned library activation, creator partnerships and sublicensing may reduce dependence, but each requires lead time and capability. The region will avoid replacing one broad package with a rushed collection of titles that carries similar cost and no coherent audience purpose.

Proposition and pricing will adapt to the resulting portfolio. If a major package leaves, affected cohorts will receive clear notice, relevant alternatives and proportionate save treatment. Bundles and annual plans must not conceal the change. If a renewal materially strengthens the service, the region may adjust price or tiering only after testing willingness and delivery.

Sports renewals will receive event- and season-level analysis. Rights costs, production, commentary, marketing, schedule, sponsorship, betting restrictions and concurrency will be included. Fans of one competition should not automatically justify an entire package. The Managing Director will examine whether sublicensing, selected matches or distribution partnerships preserve value more responsibly.

Distribution relationships will be reviewed alongside rights. Pay television, telecommunications, platform and retail bundles can broaden reach but affect customer control, data, pricing and revenue share. Renewal scenarios will show whether a partner strengthens the value of a content package or merely obscures weak direct economics.

Operational cutover will have named regional ownership. Rights metadata, availability, downloads, search, marketing assets, advertising commitments, partner feeds, support scripts and billing must change together. The Managing Director will require rehearsed high-risk transitions and a command structure for unexpected access or customer issues.

By year-end, the region should have completed or advanced priority renewals within a sustainable envelope, reduced dependence on poorly used breadth and maintained a clear customer proposition. The board should understand where the service has chosen scarcity deliberately and how local rights options are being built.

Leadership responsibilities

The Regional Managing Director will lead Americas operations and represent the region to the group board and Group Chief Executive. They will own one forecast across subscribers, advertising, rights, marketing and cash. Global disagreement will be escalated with evidence and options, not expressed through local non-compliance.

They will lead country and functional executives through difficult rights outcomes, aligning incentives with regional value. No market may defend an historic package solely through gross audience, and no global team may assume that a uniform decision has uniform local consequence. Leadership succession and local-market depth will be strengthened.

The executive will engage studios, leagues, distributors, advertisers and selected public stakeholders at senior level. Negotiating credibility depends on keeping commitments and maintaining confidentiality, including when the region is prepared to exit.

Measures of success

The board will track regional contribution, cash, subscriber cohort value, advertising yield, acquisition, retention and price realisation. Rights measures include cost, utilisation, audience purpose, renewal variance, territorial efficiency, alternatives developed and obligations delivered.

Customer outcomes include access accuracy, communication, complaints, save effectiveness and migration after portfolio change. Distribution measures cover partner economics, data, activation and churn. Strategic success includes fewer single-package dependencies and a stronger pipeline of local or flexible rights options.

Candidate profile

Candidates should bring more than 28 years in streaming, television, sports, film distribution or subscription media, with a substantial regional P&L. They must have personally shaped major rights renewals and managed the customer or channel consequence of walking away. Experience across several American markets is valuable.

The board will seek examples of narrowing a rights package, investing behind an underused asset and replacing content dependency without destroying the proposition. Candidates should understand windows, territories, subscriber cohorts, advertising, distribution, production and international contracting.

The successful leader will combine negotiating strength with audience empathy. They must tolerate public speculation, resist sunk-cost and prestige pressure and align global and local executives around a decision that remains uncertain until signature.

Compensation and appointment terms

Annual base compensation is expected between USD 500,000 and USD 750,000, accompanied by annual incentive and long-term participation. Reward will balance regional value, rights discipline, customer outcomes, cash and leadership depth. Final terms will reflect comparable P&L and negotiation scale plus verified forfeited awards.

Confidentiality

The portfolio is unnamed because rights negotiations, walk-away positions, customer economics and distribution alternatives are sensitive. Detailed materials will follow identity, conflict and confidentiality review. Applicants must not provide unreleased bids, subscriber data, contract terms or counterparty strategy from another organisation.