Yale Law School

Princeton University

Harvard Business School Executive Education

Stanford University Graduate School of Business

(PARIS: CLA) Diversified global technology company. Vice Chairman of Board. Chair: Remuneration and Nominating Committee.

CLARANOVA

Board of Directors

I chair the board of The Center for News, Technology & Innovation - CNTI - a global policy research center aimed at cultivating better-informed media and internet policy discussions to enable an independent, competitive news media and an open internet world-wide.

CNTI is built with leading thinkers in journalism, technology, research and policy who are dedicated to working together towards feasible solutions to the global challenges of our digital news environment. 

We believe an independent press and an open internet must be at the center of our free societies globally. Our research and work is available free to all to better inform the world.

Read about our board, our supporters and our work at www.innovating.news

Center for News, Technology & Innovation - CNTI

Executive Chairman

NextNews Ventures is an early-stage fund investing in emerging leaders in media, technology and telecom. Current portfolio includes www.skift.com, www.gameontechnology.com, www.column.us and stealth startups. Successful investor exits include www.insider.com, www.storm8.com, www.digitalturbine.com and www.storyblocks.com. We love verbs chasing nouns, but we invest in the next generation of disruptive technology, media and telecommunications.

NextNews Ventures

General Partner -- Silicon Valley/West Coast

(TORONTO: Y) Leading local directory and business information provider in Canada. Today, over 50% of revenues sourced to digital operations. Chair: Governance Committee of the Board. Member: Audit Committee; HR and Compensation Committee.

Yellow Pages / Pages Jaunes – Canada

I led a digital transformation at McClatchy, one of America's second-largest local news and information companies, operating dailies and digital properties in 30 markets in 14 states, including such renowned brands as The Miami Herald, The Ft. Worth Star-Telegram and The Charlotte Observer.

Buoyed by a world-class team of newspeople, technologists and leaders, I developed and executed strategy to accelerate the pace and cadence of digital at McClatchy (with its 60M monthly active users and 1+ million paid customer relationships). The result was the transformation of the 162-year-old business from an overwhelming reliance on a declining print revenue to a near-even split of growing digital and print advertising revenue, and a balanced distribution of subscriber revenue and advertising revenue. We also continued a tradition of award-winning independent local journalism in the public interest, adding four Pulitzer Prizes to McClatchy’s 50+ total. 

I was asked to assume the CEO leadership role by the McClatchy board, which I joined in 2013 as its first digital board director. I also led the company through a financial restructuring prompted by a $1.4B pension that covered 25,000 employees and retirees — nearly 10X the number of active employees when I assumed the CEO role.

McClatchy

President & CEO

Storyblocks is a fast-growing venture-backed content and technology company providing stock photo, video and audio resources to a new generation of digital storytellers. With an unlimited-download subscription business model, Storyblocks is breaking the paradigm of quality multimedia asset transactions.  Recently voted a Top 50 Places to Work in the WDC region.

Storyblocks

(NASDAQ: APPS) Leading platform-solutions provider to mobile operators, app-publishers and advertisers globally, providing 1.5B consumers worldwide with smarter ways to search, shop and manage apps. Partners include T-Mobile, Vodafone, Telefónica, Turkcell, Telecom Italia, SingTel, Smart, Singtel Optus and Telstra. Member: Audit Committee.

Digital Turbine

Board of Directors [$APPS]

(NYSE: MNI) Large news and information company. Publisher of The Miami Herald, Charlotte Observer, Kansas City Star, Sacramento Bee and many essential local news brands  around the U.S.

• Accelerated business performance and corporate strategy resulting in successful sale of BlogHer to SheKnows Media in October 2014.
• Coached co-founders on operating performance and revenue initiatives that led to doubling the valuation of this privately-held media company focused on women. Venrock, Comcast and Azure are investors.

BlogHer [Sold to SheKnows Media//PenskeMedia]

Chairman of the Board

Advisor on strategy and corporate development for Storm8, Inc. one of the leading developers of mobile social games for iOS and Android, with more than 1 billion total downloads to date.

Storm8 [sold to Stillfront Group AB ($SF-FNSE)]

Board Advisor [$SF]

Lead independent director for largest venture-backed mobile applications discovery and download marketplace. Acquired by Digital Turbine Q1 2015. Focus areas include corporate development, strategy and helping executive leaders accelerate growth among world’s leading mobile operators, OEMs, media brands and retailers.

Appia [sold to Digital Turbine ($APPS)]

Executive Chairman and member, Board of Directors

Served as lead independent director of top location-aware mobile commerce, advertising and consumer-applications company.  Assumed executive chairmanship to assist in development of  strategic and financial plans, and in the corporate development process that resulted in acquisition of WHERE by EBAY Inc. in Q2 2011.

WHERE Inc [Sold to EBay/PayPal ($PYPL)]

Drive profitable growth and customer engagement as head of ELNK's Access, PeoplePC, Voice and Value-added Services businesses. Also generated operating efficiencies for such shared services as Operations, Information Technology and Customer Support.  This group’s mandate is to deliver best-in-class Internet access and offer engaging products and applications that are not only safe, secure and reliable, but also useful, valuable and enjoyable.

EarthLink

EVP & President, Access & Audience

Created VAS strategy, restructuring business unit into four focus areas to achieve faster growth -- Portals and Platforms; Search, Commerce & Communications; Security, Software, Subscriptions and Services; and Partnership and Distribution. Responsibility for consumer services including portal, search, e-commerce, security, software and subscriptions for this leading communications and internet company with millions of consumer customers across the U.S.

EVP & President, Value Added Services

Head of Yahoo!'s Media and Information businesses. Substantially increased operating results at Yahoo's News, Finance, Sports, Health, Weather, Education, Kids and Astrology units. Innovated a technology-driven media and content strategy that kept these properties as No. 1 in their categories despite intense external challenges from competitors as diverse as Google, Microsoft and major media companies.

Yahoo

VP & GM - Media and Information

• Cofounder of technology-led media company targeting empowered adults, producing two PBS television series, a Nielsen Top 200 web business with peak audience of 4 million unique users and peak first-year revenue run-rate of $4 million prior to dot.com downturn six months post launch.
• Chaired board composed of leading venture capitalists and CEOs.
• Responsible for overall management of business, including operations, strategy, capital allocation and brand.
• Spun assets into Success Television, a video-centric internet business targeting $3 billion annual market in outsourced professional development training.

MyPrimeTime Inc. & Success Television

CEO & Chairman

General manager of one of the first profitable internet content sites. Also served as CEO of ThriveOnline -- a JV between TIME Inc. and AOL and as VP - Worldwide Development at TIME Inc. New Media. CNNfn.com was the first profitable online news unit among leading brands.

Time Warner Inc.

VP & GM - CNN Financial News Internet and other positions

• Responsible for product management and editorial content at one of the Internet’s first revenue-generating, advertising-supported search-engines. 
• Member of executive team that took Infoseek public and sustained its reputation as a technology innovator on the Internet prior to acquisition by Walt Disney Corp.

Infoseek

VP of Product Management & Editor in Chief

• Senior executive responsible for online-services business (DJNewsRetrieval, now Factiva, and WSJ.com) outside the U.S. and Canada.
• Doubled revenues and opened more than a dozen new overseas markets, extending reach to more than 50 countries in Latin America, Europe, Mideast and Asia.

Dow Jones & Co.

Director and Editor - Business Information Services International

• Senior news executive for Dow Jones in Japan, directing 10 reporters and editors in the largest market outside the U.S.
• Increased production 40% and kept costs level despite period of strong yen appreciation and economic and political upheaval.

The Wall Street Journal

Tokyo Bureau Chief

• Deputy London Bureau Chief, with frequent reporting assignments in Western and Eastern Europe, the Mideast, Africa and Asia.
• Correspondent in Persian Gulf War (Operation Desert Storm); member of WSJ team whose war reporting was finalist for a Pulitzer Prize. Other assingments included the breakup of Yugoslavia, disintegration of Soviet Union, and Western European integration and macroeconomics.

Craig Forman