STV names UKTV Play chief as head of digital

Richard Williams

Scottish commercial broadcaster STV has named UKTV Play chief Richard Williams as managing director of digital television.

Williams twill take charge of STV’s newly formed Digital division as part of a strategy to place digital at the centre of the organisation to deliver its three-year growth plan.

He joins STV from UKTV where he was general Manager of UKTV Play, the VOD service from the multichannel broadcaster behind channels such as Dave, Gold, Really and Drama.

Prior to this, Williams held senior digital roles at Virgin Media, where he was head of digital-first content, Yahoo, where he was UK head of media and editor-in-chief, ITV, where he was director, multiplatform production and the BBC, where he was hHead of multiplatform production.

STV plans to invest £15 million (€17 million) in new original content and its digital service STV Player as part of its three-year strategy.

Williams will joint the Scottish broadcaster in October. He said: “I’m thrilled to be moving to STV at such an exciting time. The digital vision that Simon has set out for STV is compelling, and I am delighted to be joining the team in Glasgow in order to help realise those ambitions.”

Simon Pitts, CEO of STV, said: “I’m delighted that Richard will head up our newly created Digital division, where we have ambitious plans to turn the STV Player into a world-class streaming service delivering a personalised ‘STV for everyone’. Richard has a fantastic track record of overseeing successful digital strategies for a range of blue-chip media organisations and he will bring invaluable expertise and innovation to the business as we deliver strong, profitable digital growth.”