NBCUniversal hired Jim Denney, a TiVo veteran who most recently was at Hulu, as executive VP and chief product officer of direct-to-consumer, overseeing Peacock‘s global product strategy.
Denney will start at NBCU next month. He will be based in New York and report to Gidon Katz, NBCU’s president of direct-to-consumer. In addition to Peacock, Denney will be responsible for product strategy for other customer-facing NBCUniversal digital platforms, including broadcast and cable entertainment apps, NBC Sports, and reality-TV streaming service Hayu.
Denney previously led the product organization at Disney’s Hulu as VP of product management. In that role, he was responsible for directing the long-term product strategy, including a complete redesign of the user interface.
Before joining Hulu in 2018, Denney spent more than 15 years leading product management and strategy for TiVo. While at TiVo, he led the launch of products ranging from DVRs and client devices to mobile and online experiences and was part of the team at TiVo that won a Primetime Emmy award for outstanding achievement in enhanced television from the Academy of Television Arts and Science in 2006.
“The Peacock team has done an exceptional job designing and scaling the platform, and the addition of a respected and collaborative leader like Jim Denney will accelerate the incredible momentum driving our business in the U.S. and beyond,” Katz said in a statement.
NBCU launched the Peacock streaming service in an early preview in April 2020 for Comcast customers, then launched it broadly in the U.S. in July in three tiers (free with ads; discounted with ads; and ad-free). Peacock provides a slate of exclusive originals, on-demand libraries of TV shows, plus films from Universal Pictures, Focus Features, DreamWorks Animation, Illumination and other studios. In addition, Peacock delivers topical content across news, sports, late-night, Spanish-language, and reality programming.
