‘Liberty Global hires Mann’

Liberty Global has hired Australian TV veteran Bruce Mann to head up its content strategy, according to a report in The Australian newspaper.

According to the report, Mann, who was previously CEO of the now closed-down horseracing pay TV channel TVN, will effectively be the international cable and pay TV group’s head of content.

He will be charged with developing strategies for units including Virgin Media in the UK and Telenet in Belgium.

TVN, which was set up by various Australian horse-racing interests a decade ago as an alternative to Sky Racing, folded in March this year after Racing New South Wales withdrew its support for the channel.

Before TVN, Mann spent 10 years as CEO of lifestyle, entertainment and kids channels provider XYZnetworks, which was replaced by Foxtel Networks after the News Corp-backed firm bought rival Australian pay TV outfit Austar.

Mann was the founding managers of Austar, whose former CEO, John Porter, is currently chief executive of Telenet. Another Australian executive and former Foxtel chief executive, Tom Mockridge, is CEO of Virgin Media.

Liberty Global could not immediately confirm the deal.