Viamedia Lands Key Industry Veteran Kim Norris as COO

NEW YORK AND LEXINGTON, Ky., March 13, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Viamedia, the television industry's leading independent provider of outsourced local television advertising services on behalf of cable companies, today announced major changes with the appointment of Kim Norris as Chief Operating Officer.  A veteran television and advertising executive, Norris will be responsible for the day-to-day operational leadership of Viamedia's advertising sales and advanced advertising including Viamedia Online and placemedia, Viamedia's recently launched programmatic ad exchange.  With dual headquarters in Lexington, Kentucky and New York City, this appointment comes after the hiring of leading media industry entrepreneur Mark Lieberman as the company's new president and CEO.

"It's a new day at Viamedia," said Mark Lieberman, President and CEO, Viamedia.  "Kim is a well-respected industry veteran who brings unparalleled leadership skills and a proven track record.  Throughout her career, she has been a driver in strategic corporate alignment and growth.  Viamedia now has a realigned executive leadership team, and new CEO, COO, CFO, and new business development team.  With a new enhanced focus on our core business, emerging advanced advertising product lines and the tectonic shift happening in the cable industry, the new Viamedia is well positioned to drive change."

Most recently, Norris served as Executive Vice President of Emerging Business and Data Analytics at Cablevision where she brought to market new data-driven insights and advanced the industry's interactive and addressable ad market.  Before that, Norris has held leadership positions at organizations that include Comcast where she built and oversaw the advertising division for the company's Northeast television markets, and the Digital Place-based Advertising Association, formerly the Out-of-home Video Advertising Bureau, where she served as founding president.  Norris has held advisory board positions with Cable Advertising Bureau, is a Betsey Magness Leadership Institute alumni, and has been recognized by a number of industry awards, including: Top 100 Women in Cable Tech by CableFax Magazine for the years 2013, 2012, and 2011; 2013 Wonder Woman by Multichannel News and WICT; and 2010 Most Significant Product or Platform-Optimum Select by ITV Today/TV of Tomorrow.

Norris replaces Joe Noonan who will be exiting as of March 24^th.  During his 6-year tenure, Noonan served as the company's Chief Revenue Officer and Chief Operating Officer.

"Viamedia has an incredible team with a salesforce of over 300 TV, digital sales representatives across 64 markets in the US serving 50 MVPD partners and over 10,000 local advertisers as well as an innovative, next generation audience based buying platform that will benefit advertisers and MVPD," said Norris. "I look forward to working with Mark and the talented Viamedia team and helping to drive the company's continued success."

Norris' appointment comes on the heels of exciting news for Viamedia this year. The company secured partnership agreements with Vyve Broadband, Metronet, Hawaiian Telcom, CDE Lightband and Bledsoe.  CableFAX also recognized Viamedia for Overall Tech Innovation for its ViamediaGO technology platform for small-medium businesses.

Earlier this year, company President & CEO Mark Lieberman realigned his senior leadership team to better support the company's employee base, MVPD partners and advertisers. His direct reports include Chris Black, Chief Financial Officer; Randy Lykes, Chief Technology Officer; Brian Hunt, Senior Vice President, Affiliate Relations and Business Development; and Becky Jones, Vice President, Marketing and Research. 

ABOUT VIAMEDIA
Viamedia is a leading provider of outsourced local advertising sales services. The company specializes in selling DMA-based advertising to local, regional and national advertisers on behalf of U.S. cable and telecommunications service providers, utility companies and municipalities. For more information on Viamedia, visit www.viamediatv.com.

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SOURCE Viamedia