Kids media brand appoints former Genius Brands International exec to oversee licensing & merchandising, sponsorships & brand integrations, and global sales of premium content.
LOS ANGELES -- Kids media brand Pocket.watch has announced the appointment of Stone Newman as Chief Revenue Officer. In his new role, Newman will oversee all of pocket.watch’s revenue generating activities and will be charged with launching those efforts initially against licensing and merchandising, sponsorships and brand integrations, and the global sales of premium content.
As the company’s global Chief Revenue Officer, Newman will focus on sponsorship and brand integration sales of pocket.watch’s growing owned and operated YouTube channels and their marquee YouTube creator partnerships including pocket.watch’s first announced partner, HobbyKidsTV. Newman will drive pocket.watch’s initiatives into licensing and merchandising and will scale those efforts to include the vibrant YouTube brands of creators partnered with pocket.watch. Pocket.watch will continue to aggressively develop their slate of premium series and Newman will be responsible for bringing those series to the global market of television and streaming distributors.
“Stone is what I would call a mythical CRO, an executive who can do it all from merchandising, to content sales, to cultivating sponsorship opportunities,” said pocket.watch founder & CEO Chris M. Williams. “He combines the right mix of big company experience, with a roll up your sleeves startup attitude, to help us achieve our goals during this explosive stage in our business.”
Prior to joining pocket.watch, Newman spent nearly his entire career dedicated to building brands that celebrate childhood fun. As president of global consumer products licensing, worldwide content sales and marketing for Genius Brands International, Newman not only oversaw the company’s global content distribution business for its catalog, spearheading all global licensing, merchandising, retail, and marketing efforts.
During his tenure at Genius Brands, Newman helped the company secure its first content sales to Nickelodeon and Netflix, secure a worldwide master toy deal with Mattel’s Fisher Price and the launch of an all-digital tween brand with YouTube called SpacePop for which he served as producer and co-creator. Additionally, the company saw its debut on License! Global’s Top 150 Global Licensors for the first time in company history under Newman’s guidance. An accomplished entrepreneur, Newman founded Sababa Toys, which he built from a start-up into a $30M toy and game manufacturer with product presence in more than 50,000 retail stores.
“From the moment I was introduced to pocket.watch, I knew it was going to be a revolutionary business,” Newman said. “I couldn’t be more excited to be a part of pocket.watch’s extraordinary team and to build up the brand’s incredible revenue opportunities. I never thought I’d say this, but being a father of toddler twin girls and a seven-and-a-half year-old son, I can’t wait to bring my new work home to my kids.”
The appointment of Newman as pocket.watch’s CRO comes directly on the heels of a series of significant business, partner and content news made by the company over the past several months. These announcements include a $6M raise in Series A funding, a partnership with HobbyKids TV, and a partnership with SNL’s Kenan Thompson for development and production of a new premium live-action sketch comedy called pocket.watch presents Skoogle.
Source: Pocket.watch
