The Ampersand Board of Directors Appoints Mike Dean to Lead Ampersand

Ethan Heftman, Ampersand's current SVP Agency Sales, named Chief Revenue Officer

NEW YORK, Jan. 29, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Ampersand today announced that its Board of Directors has named Mike Dean as president, starting February 5. Dean, an industry veteran and leader in advanced TV and video advertising strategy and operations, will lead Ampersand in its evolution as a provider of data-driven, multiscreen advertising solutions for the industry.  He will report to the Ampersand Board of Directors, including representatives from Ampersand's three owners Charter Communications, Comcast and Cox. 

As president, Dean will work with the Ampersand leadership team, in conjunction with its owners, to unlock the full potential of the company's assets, including the largest share of multiscreen television inventory, the richest set of deterministic and actionable data insights, and the largest addressable TV footprint in the U.S. He will lead all aspects of the company with the goal of accelerating Ampersand's mission to make it easier for advertisers to plan, buy and measure data-driven multiscreen television at scale.

Ampersand also announced that it will be enhancing its leadership team with the appointment of Ethan Heftman, an advanced advertising sales executive with a proven track record of building sales teams and delivering results for clients in the current media landscape, to the newly created position of Chief Revenue Officer.  In this role, Ethan will lead all sales and revenue driving functions across Ampersand.

"Just as Ampersand makes individual MVPDs' assets greater than the sum of their parts, we believe the combination of Mike's advanced advertising industry leadership and Ethan's media sales expertise will deliver above and beyond their individual strengths. Couple this with the extended leadership team already in place, and Ampersand's potential has never been stronger," said James Rooke, President of Comcast Advertising. "On behalf of Ampersand's Board of Directors, we could not be more optimistic about the vital role that Ampersand will continue to play for our businesses, and the industry at large."

Both Dean and Heftman bring a breadth and diversification of experience to their respective roles.

Most recently, Dean was a Managing Director in Deloitte Consulting's Technology, Media, & Telecommunications sector leading the Ad Sales practice, focused on advising both new and traditional media clients on sales strategy, product, technology, data, and transformation initiatives. Prior to Deloitte, Mike was the SVP of Advanced Advertising at Paramount, leading an organization that was accountable for Advanced Advertising, Data Partnerships & Addressable TV, and Ad Sales Research & Insights. Before joining Paramount, he was VP of Programmatic and Advanced Advertising at Disney ABC, responsible for advanced TV and digital programmatic. Earlier in his career, he was VP of Platform Sales at Videology, held product management and partnership roles at Microsoft, and served as a software developer at Dell.

Dean graduated magna cum laude with a degree in Information Systems from Texas A&M University, and holds an MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also proudly served in the U.S. Army as an airborne infantry soldier and was deployed to Uganda for Operation Support Hope.

The new CRO, Heftman, was SVP of agency sales for Ampersand, where he led sales strategy and execution for agency holding companies and their regional and national advertisers. Before joining Ampersand, he was SVP of Advanced Advertising and Digital Sales for A&E Networks. In this role, he led strategy, product development, and sales for A+E's growing digital and advanced linear advertising efforts, building high performing teams across linear precision and performance, digital direct, and programmatic specialty areas. Prior to joining A+E, Heftman worked on the agency side as SVP and Director of Investment for Initiative. Earlier in his career, he held national broadcast investment roles at GroupM and OMD USA.

Ampersand Boilerplate:

Ampersand is Moving TV Forward™. As the industry's largest source of combined multiscreen TV inventory and viewership insights, we are changing the way TV is bought and measured. Powered by industry leading aggregated, and with a commitment to protecting personal information, Ampersand gives advertisers true audience first planning, scale in execution, and advanced measurement of their TV investments. Ampersand represents 117M multiscreen households and over 75% of addressable households in the U.S. (64M households). Whether a local or national advertiser, we help clients reach their unique target audience and deliver their stories – anytime, anywhere and on whatever device.  Ampersand is owned by Comcast Corporation, Charter Communications, Inc. and Cox Communications. For more information, please visit Ampersand at www.ampersand.tv 

SOURCE Ampersand