zeebox affirms commitment to US launch with appointment of senior media executive Jason Forbes to lead US operations
London, UK, 14th March 2012: zeebox today announces the appointment of Jason Forbes to head up US operations in preparation for the launch of its ground-breaking social TV service in the US market.
Jason joins Zeebox from Time Warner Cable Media in New York where he was Senior Vice President. As head of their Strategy, New Products and Marketing units, Jason was charged with defining, prioritizing and enabling new ventures and capabilities across agencies and advertisers at the national and local level. This included launching Time Warner Cable Media's enhanced iTV product suite, new ad-supported On Demand channels and Marketing Services.
Jason also led the development of their Data Intelligence suite, which offers cross-platform audience viewership and insights to advertisers using set-top box and 3rd party data.
Prior to joining Time Warner, Jason spent 10 years with Capgemini in Europe and the US, in his last role as VP and GM of Strategy & Transformation for Capgemini's Media practice, consulting clients including Warner Bros, MTV, CBS and News Corporation in business transformation.
Ernesto Schmitt, CEO of zeebox said: "We're delighted to have Jason join the zeebox team. He brings significant domain expertise and a broad set of relationships in the US broadcasting and media industries. As EVP USA, Jason will apply his operational experience and strategic insight to supporting our launch in the US market."
zeebox is currently finalising its launch partnerships with key industry players in preparation to launch its consumer service across the US TV landscape during Q2. A key part of Jason's role will be to build up zeebox's US team and operations, and to develop close partnerships across leading distributors, programmers, agencies and advertisers. Jason will be based in New York City.
Since launching in October 2011, zeebox has led innovation in the market of social TV apps, uniquely enabling consumers to discover TV content through their extended social graph, to follow their favourite celebrities' TV viewing, and to automatically get more information about the programmes they're watching. zeebox knows what consumers are watching, and engages them with relevant content and ecommerce opportunities in synch with live TV.
Zeebox is today available in the UK free to users at zeebox.com, and as an app for iPad and iPhone, with Android smartphone and tablet versions to follow in the coming weeks.