At COO (Boardroom Media) we track over 1,000,000 startups and over 5,000,000 people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top United States based COO’ operating in the Journalism space. If you think a COO’ is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on [email protected].
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Vincent Wu
COO of NewsBreak
Vincent Wu is the COO (& CFO) at NewsBreak, the nation’s #1 news platform – a unicorn startup of local news with 40 million+ users in the U.S. and 300+ FTEs. He built things from scratch – in <3 years, grew DAU from 1M to 12M, MAU from 3M to 40M, and revenue from a single-digit to three-digit million $$ and becoming the #1 news app in the country. Scaled the platform to become the #4 audience network in the U.S. (behind Google, Facebook, and Google News). Source: https://www.parse.ly/resources/data-studies/referrer-dashboard Creator economy advocate and practitioner. Launched the first creator program for the local news ecosystem, and secured $115M Series-C funding. Previously, executive and well-known "growth master" at Huffington Post, Yahoo News, and AOL. Scaled audience and turned around businesses. Data-driven operator.
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About NewsBreak: News Break is the Nation’s #1 Intelligent Local News Platform
Rebekah Monson
Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of WhereBy.Us
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About WhereBy.Us: A platform that enables creators to build a media business for their community.
Richard Caccappolo
Chief Operating Officer of MailOnline
Richard Caccappolo is currently the Chief Operating Officer of MailOnline.com, the most successful online media site in the world. Prior to MailOnline.com, he was the SVP of iVillage and is one of the leading digital media executives in NYC. He has over 20 years of experience in e-commerce, digital monetization, new media and product development. Mr. Caccappolo served as the Chief Executive Officer of ORCA Digital Services Inc. at oneTXT, Inc., as Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of iVillage Inc., as the Chief Technology Officer of Kodak Polychrome Graphics and as Director, Information Systems, Europe at Sun Chemicals. Before joining Sun Chemicals he served as Senior Manager of Andersen Consulting (now Accenture). He has been recognized for leading the development of interactive and community features throughout his career. Mr. Caccappolo received his M.B.A. from New York University, Leonard N. Stern School of Business and his B.S. from Cornell University.
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About MailOnline: MailOnline is an English-language newspaper website that offers information about world news, entertainment, celebrity news, and more.
Wenda Harris Millard
Vice Chairman, President & Chief Operating Officer of MediaLink
In April 2009, Wenda Harris Millard became President and COO of MediaLink LLC, a leading strategic advisory and business development firm that provides critical counsel and direction to the media, advertising and entertainment industries and to companies and investors that interact with those sectors. Before joining MediaLink, Millard was Co-CEO and President, Media for Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc. She joined MSLO in July 2007 after three years as a member of its Board of Directors. Millard oversaw MSLO’s media businesses, which include publishing, internet and broadcasting. She was the driving force behind creating cross-platform programs for marketers in TV, digital, magazines and radio. Before MSLO, Millard was Chief Sales Officer at Yahoo! where she led the team that drove revenue from $700 million to over $6 billion in six years and was consistently credited as the number one sales organization in the media industry. On an industry-wide level her work at Yahoo! established brand advertising on the web. Prior to Yahoo!, Millard was Chief Internet Officer at Ziff Davis Media and President of Ziff Davis Internet. Previously, Millard was a founding member of the executive team at DoubleClick, where she served as Executive Vice President responsible for establishing the DoubleClick brand and overseeing the operations of DoubleClick Media. She also served as President and Group Publisher of SRDS, Senior Vice President and Publisher of Family Circle and Executive Vice President/Group Publisher of Adweek, Mediaweek and Brandweek magazines. Millard has received numerous industry awards including being named in 2012 one of the “100 Most Influential Women in Advertising in the Last 100 Years”; the 2011 Oracle Award from Springboard; the 2009 ad:tech Lifetime Achievement Award; the 2007 John A. Reisenbach Award for Distinguished Citizenship; the 2006 “Advertising Person of the Year” Silver Medal Award from the AAF and the 2005 Matrix Award for “Women Who Change the World”. Advertising Age also acknowledged her as a “Digital Media Master” — one of the 20 most influential executives in interactive media. She was the subject of a profile by Tom Brokaw as part of NBC’s “Women to Watch” series. Active on behalf of the advertising industry throughout her career, Millard is past Chairman of the Interactive Advertising Bureau and former President of the Advertising Club of New York. She has served on the Boards of the Advertising Council, the American Advertising Federation, the Advertising Education Foundation and others. Currently, she serves on the boards of Verifone Inc., Millenial Media and Simulmedia. She also sits on the board of the James Beard Foundation. She served two terms as a Trustee of Trinity College in Hartford. Millard holds an MBA from Harvard University and a BA from Trinity College.
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About MediaLink: MediaLink is a strategic advisory firm that provides strategic advisory and implementation services to companies at all stages.
George Grobar
COO of Penske Media Corporation
George Grobar is Chief Operating Officer (COO) at PMC with responsibility for overseeing the company’s operating units and business plans. George joined PMC in 2009 and in addition to his role as COO is also currently a Director on the PMC Board. George joined PMC as Chief Financial Officer and was actively involved in integrating several new acquisitions into the company, building the PMC joint venture operations in India, and playing a lead role in the integration of the Variety operations. George has over 25 years of financial and operational experience in new media, consumer products and technology enterprises at PMC, The Walt Disney Company, and Unisys Corp. Prior to joining PMC, George was the Senior Vice President of Disney Mobile, reporting to the President of The Walt Disney Internet Group. George led the launch of a new strategic business from the ground up, competing with major players for share of mobile phones in the family market. Before moving to Disney Mobile, George held several senior positions in Disney business units including Vice President of Disney Ecommerce, Vice President of GO.com Mail and Website, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer for Disney Direct Marketing and Walt Disney Art Classics, and the Director of Business Operations & Control for Division Controllership. Prior to The Walt Disney Company, George was with Unisys for 8 years, working in the Corporate Treasury organization and progressing to Senior Manager roles in Finance and Product Management in the manufacturing, software development, and hardware engineering groups in Southern California. George has a B.A. degree in Economics and English, magna cum laude, from Amherst College in Massachusetts and an MBA in Finance from the University of Michigan.
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About Penske Media Corporation: PMC is a Leading Digital Media and Publishing Company
Michael Laur
Chief Operating Officer & Co-Founder of Uproxx Media Group
Michael Laur is a Co-Founder of Woven Digital, LLC and serves as its Chief Operating Officer. Michael has built brands, shaped markets and has over 14 years of successfully selling and packaging integrated media programs to and for top brands online. He was head of Entertainment Sales & Strategy at Yahoo. He was the Digital Publisher for Nielsen Business Media’s brands: The Hollywood Reporter, Billboard, AdWeek, MediaWeek and BrandWeek. Before that, he was one of the founding employees of Conversant, Inc. (formerly ValueClick, Inc.). During his tenure as Vice President of Sales and Business Development at Conversant Media, he was responsible for building out the international markets in Europe, South and North America. His accomplishments in innovative marketing platforms, ad units and awards interfaces have been recognized in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, PR Review and The Los Angeles Times.
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About Uproxx Media Group: Uproxx Media Group is a millennial focused digital media company, producing and distributing news/pop-culture content to nearly 50M users.
Lia Lorenzano-Kennett
COO of Revere Digital
Lia Lorenzano-Kennett has been working behind the scenes in the personal-technology industry since there was a personal technology industry. Most recently, she led all business efforts at AllThingsD.com and for the D: All Things Digital conferences. She started her career working for Guy Kawasaki at Apple Computer, and she produced Apple’s first-ever Worldwide Developers Conference. She has also produced such events as Agenda, Demo, DemoMobile (now DemoFall), Netscape’s DevCon and Vortex, along with a host of others. Lia was also an independent producer, whose clients included Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal, Harvard Law School, Reed Business Information, Stanford’s Institute for International Studies and August Capital. She holds a B.A. in art history and has completed the Executive Leadership Program at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.
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About Kennett Productions Inc., Revere Digital: Revere Digital LLC is the independent media company behind Re/code and the Code Conference.
Natan Edelsburg
COO of MuckRack
Natan Edelsburg is the Chief Operating Officer at Muck Rack, a digital PR and journalism platform, where he handles the business side of the company.
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About MuckRack: Muck Rack is the new standard in public relations software. Easily search for journalists, monitor news, and build reports.
Emily Reeves
COO, Co-Founder of PressBaby
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About PressBaby: PressBaby offers Newspaper Next and ZineDay that convert text-based articles into video and audio.