Digital advertising executive Pete Stein has been hired by Fullscreen as general manager and head of its brand group to drive sales and marketing for the multichannel network (MCN) giant. Meantime, former MTV executive Van Toffler will head up a new studio producing original content for Otter Media, the AT&T and Chernin Group-backed company that owns Fullscreen.
The appointments reflect a ramped-up focus on creating original content and building momentum for both Otter Media and Fullscreen as over-the-top competition heats up in 2016.
Toffler will run a new, digital-first studio called "Gunpowder & Sky," which will create a variety of content ranging from short-form video to full-length movies, according to Re/code. Previously, Toffler spent 28 years under Viacom's banner, most notably as president of MTV and MTV2, overseeing influential series like The Real World and Beavis and Butthead. He also launched MTV Films, which produced movies like Napoleon Dynamite, Hustle and Flow and Election. He left Viacom last February to run his own startup, Below the Radar, a content creation and acquisition company.
The studio will shop its content to various outlets including YouTube Red, Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX), Apple's (NASDAQ: AAPL) iTunes, and Hulu, among others, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Stein, in the meantime, will lead Fullscreen's brand group, handling strategy and execution for clients across the MCN's media management and sales units. Integrating social media studio McBeard, which Fullscreen acquired last May, is also one of his new responsibilities, according to Variety. Stein's past experience includes a term as global CEO of digital agency Razorfish.
For more:
- see this Variety article
- see this Re/code article
- see this L.A. Times article
Related articles:
Fullscreen, like MiTu, targets bigger OTT audience, revenues with premium strategy
YouTube MCN land grab is 'all but over,' analyst says, but potential $10B market still worth a look
Online video titans Chernin, Armstrong keep focus on getting more content, expanding internationally
Maker Studios stars to create content for Vimeo, opening doors beyond YouTube