New Paramount D2C boss Cindy Holland brings in Jane Wiseman, Efrain Miron
Cindy Holland (left) and Jane Wiseman
New Paramount’s incoming direct-to-consumer (D2C) head Cindy Holland is set to appoint Jane Wiseman and Efrain Miron, her former colleagues at both Netflix and Sister, to her new team.
The appointments, first reported by Deadline, will see Wiseman take a senior post on the programming side while Miron’s role will be focused on business affairs.
This week it was confirmed that Holland, who spent 18 years at Netflix spearheading acquisitions and later original content, will lead New Paramount’s streaming operation as chair of D2C when the Skydance-Paramount merger officially closes on August 7.
Wiseman is a veteran development and programming executive, with her previous roles including senior VP of comedy programming at both NBCUniversal and Chernin Entertainment. She later joined Netflix in 2014 as VP of original series and head of comedy, reporting to Holland.
She left the streamer in 2021, not long after Holland, and later consulted for Prime Video and Amazon Studios before Holland hired her last year as head of US television at UK-headquartered prodco Sister.
Holland herself left Sister in October 2024 to take an advisory role at Skydance ahead of its merger with Paramount.
Miron joined Netflix in 2012, climbing to VP of original series (business affairs) in 2017 before leaving in 2021. In 2023, he was hired by Holland as president of strategy and business affairs at Sister, where he oversaw the company’s strategy across production and distribution, in addition to investments and partnerships.
There is significant industry intrigue around the kind of content strategy that Holland will look to employ, both in the US and for Paramount+’s international operation, when she takes the reins of New Paramount’s streaming programming.
Holland played an instrumental role in Netflix’s entry into original content, which revolutionised the content business and ultimately initiated the streaming wars. She is credited with greenlighting early influential Netflix originals including House of Cards, Orange is the New Black, The Crown and Stranger Things, among many others.
Elsewhere, Skydance Media named a 10-person board of directors, including Oracle CEO Safra Catz and former Paramount Pictures chairman and CEO Sherry Lansing.
The board of New Paramount primarily comprises the largest shareholders in the combined entity, among them New Paramount chairman and CEO David Ellison, Lawrence Investments president Paul Marinelli and RedBird Capital Partners’ founder and managing partner Gerry Cardinale and chairman John Thornton.
Software giant Oracle, led by Ellison’s father Larry Ellison, and private equity outfit RedBird Capital are key financial backers of the US$8bn deal.
The other non-independent board directors are New Paramount president Jeff Shell, chief strategy officer and chief operating officer Andy Gordon and Catz.
In addition to Lansing, the other independent board directors are Justin Hamill, MD and chief legal officer at private equity firm Silver Lake, and former Barclays vice chairman Barbara Byrne.
Since the Skydance-Paramount merger gained regulatory approval from the Federal Communications Commission last month after a lengthy review process, the announcements have come thick and fast ahead of the merger’s planned completion on August 7.
On Monday, Skydance confirmed the leadership team and structure for New Paramount, with several widely expected appointments and some less-expected departures.
In addition to David Ellison, Shell, Gordon and Holland, the senior executive team includes George Cheeks, chair of TV media; Dana Goldberg, chair of Paramount Television and co-chair of Paramount Pictures; Josh Greenstein, vice chair of platforms; and Kevin MacLellan, the former international chairman of NBCUniversal.
Among those confirmed to be leaving Paramount Global are co-CEOs Chris McCarthy and Brian Robbins, chief content licensing officer Dan Cohen, CEO of Paramount Streaming Tom Ryan, Paramount Motion Picture Group president Mike Ireland and Nina L Diaz, who serves as president of content and chief creative officer for Showtime/MTV Entertainment Studios.
Skydance said New Paramount will be structured in three primary business segments: studios, D2C and TV media. Further announcements are expected later in the week once New Paramount officially begins trading on the NASDAQ stock exchange (under the ticker symbol PSKY) and its new leadership team can begin to publicly articulate a strategy.
