Turner Asia hires NBCU exec

Turner International Asia Pacific has poached a top executive from NBCUniversal to lead its general entertainment channels, including recently acquired pan-Asian channel WarnerTV.

Marianne Lee will serve as VP of content and general entertainment at Turner International Asia Pacific from May 2, reporting to its president Ricky Ow, who joined Turner at the beginning of the year from Sony Pictures Television (SPT).

Lee will relocate to Hong Kong from Singapore for the job, having most recently been the director of programming and acquisitions for NBCUniversal-owned Universal Networks International.

Prior to Universal, Lee was senior director of programming at SPT Networks Asia, a company she was with for almost five years.

Lee will now “define and execute” content and channel strategy for Turner Broadcasting System’s general entertainment brands in Asia Pacific, which include WarnerTV, TCM Turner Classic Movies and truTV.

“With WarnerTV now a Turner brand, she arrives at a critical time to build on its existing number one ranking and to develop our entertainment brand bouquet even further,” Ow said.

Turner took full operational responsibility for WarnerTV’s programming, distribution, advertising sales and marketing last week.

The media firm has pledged to double the number of first-run series on WarnerTV in 2014 and increase programming hours by 30%, though there will be no immediate alterations to the branding or positioning of the channel.