In a memo obtained by TVNewser, NBCU CEO Jeff Zucker announced the NBC and Comcast executives who will head up the transition teams as the two companies enter a joint venture announced earlier this month.
The Operational Transition Team will be led by Salil Mehta, NBCU’s President of Business Operations, Strategy and Development while John Eck, President of NBC TV Network and Mediaworks will be NBC’s rep on the Administrative Transition Team.
Zucker writes, “The teams will start meeting weekly after the New Year and will guide our planning until the deal closes.”
The note after the jump…
From: Jeff Zucker (NBC Universal)
Sent: Wednesday, December 16, 2009 4:14 PM
Subject: NBCU/Comcast Transition Team Announcement
Just two weeks after our big announcement, I’m pleased to let you know that we have set up the two transition teams for our joint venture with Comcast. The teams will start meeting weekly after the New Year and will guide our planning until the deal closes. I will be overseeing their efforts, along with Comcast’s Chief Operating Officer Steve Burke and CFO Mike Angelakis.
The Operational Transition Team will be led by Salil Mehta, our President of Business Operations, Strategy and Development. Joe Donnelly, CFO, Comcast Programming Group, will be Comcast’s lead representative working with Salil.
This team will focus on planning all aspects of how the two programming and digital groups will operate together after the deal closes. We will look to Salil and his team to develop an overall schedule, identify programming and marketing opportunities, recommend organizational structures, etc.
Jeff Shell, President of the Comcast Programming Group, and Jeff Gaspin, Chairman, NBCU TV Entertainment, will both be heavily involved with this team.
The second team is the Administrative Transition Team, which will be led by Comcast’s Bob Victor, Senior Vice President, Strategic and Financial Planning. John Eck, President of NBC TV Network and Mediaworks, will be NBCU’s lead representative working with Bob.
This team’s goal will be to plan for all administrative aspects of how the joint venture will operate after the deal closes. Bob and his team will address benefits, accounting, taxes, cash management, information services, polices and other legal matters, etc. In January the administrative transition team will develop an overall schedule and reach out to various executives from Comcast, NBCU and GE to work through specific transition initiatives.
Mike Angelakis and our CFO Lynn Calpeter will both be heavily involved with this team.
Let me emphasize that all the work of these two teams will be focused on transition planning relating to the operations of the joint venture after the close, and will be conducted in a manner consistent with the rules of conduct that have been put in place that prohibit our two companies from acting as one combined company prior to closing. To this end, business interactions between the companies (including information requests) should be coordinated through the transition team leaders.
If you have a question about the integration process going forward, you can reach out to the transition team leaders or to Rick Cotton, NBCU General Counsel, or Scott Seeley, SVP of Corporate and Transactions.
This is the beginning of what will be a thorough and well-thought-out process that will involve many of us across every area of both companies. I will be sure to keep you up to date as our progress continues.