Jukin hires ex-Wazee TV exec

YouTube aggregator Jukin Media has hired former Wazee Digital TV and film chief Greg Bond to become its VP, global licensing.

Multichannel network Jukin licenses hundreds of sharable videos each week.

Based out of Jukin’s LA office, new recruit Bond will look to expand the firm’s licensing business, which sees the company search YouTube for sharable content and viral videos to acquire and distribute through its own channels or licence to third parties.

Bond will also coordinate operations between LA and Jukin satellite offices in New York and London. He will report to Cameron Saless, chief growth officer.

“The creative landscape is changing rapidly, with buyers putting a premium on engaging, organic, shareable video content,” said Bond. “I’m excited to help Jukin expand and continue to satisfy the global creative community’s tremendous appetite for UGC video.”

Jukin has a catalogue of around 30,000 user-generated videos in its library. As part of a divisional reorganisation aimed at growing the business, Andrew Dignan has been named VP, licensing and David O’Hare becomes VP, international licensing.

In his former role at cloud video services firm Wazee, where he was VP of film and TV licensing, Bond found ways of monetising content for its suppliers, which included major film and television studios, broadcast and cable networks, independent producers and content creators, and digital networks and OTT platforms.

“The demand for Jukin’s content has grown by more than 300% over the past two years thanks to an amazing acquisitions team and the hard work of our licensing team led by Andrew and David,” said Saless.

“Bringing additional talent like Greg on board will add depth to the team and allow us to accelerate our expansion into new segments and territories across the globe.”

Jukin, which owns brands such as Fail Army and Pet Collective was last year embroiled in a row with content creator Devin Graham over a video the latter posted using the title People Are Awesome, to which Jukins owns rights.

Jukin apologised after ordering the video to be taken down from YouTube, and subsequently said it had paid out more than US$5 million to content creators since 2009.