Starz boosts international networks team with pair of promotions

Darren Nielson and Jeff Cooke

Lionsgate-owned Starz has announced a pair of senior promotions in its international networks team.

As announced by Superna Kalle, president of International Networks for Starz, Darren Nielson has been promoted to executive vice president of distribution and business development while Jeff Cooke has been made senior vice president of programming for international networks.

Since joining the company in 2018 from Netflix, Nielson has played a key role in expanding the Starzplay SVOD service across Canada, Latin America and Europe along with negotiating distribution deals with the likes of Amazon, Apple, Orange, Vodafone and Claro.

Cooke similarly joined in 2018 and has overseen programming for the international expansion of the Starz direct-to-consumer subscription service Starzplay. He previously served as vice president of global digital at Lionsgate and has held positions at Miramax and MGM.

Superna Kalle said: “These are two well-deserved promotions that recognize Darren and Jeff’s invaluable and integral contributions to the success of Starzplay since our launch more than three years ago. Darren has achieved major success in expanding our partner & territory reach to more than 60 countries around the globe and Jeff has built an incredible track record developing and managing the success of our strong and curated slate of scripted global programming.”