LOS ANGELES: Jonathan Miller, a former chief executive of AOL and once considered
a potential CEO at Yahoo Inc., will soon be appointed head
of digital strategy for News
Corp., according to a person familiar with the matter.
Miller, 51, was eyed last year as a replacement for Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang, before Time Warner Inc.'s AOL invoked a noncompete clause that blocked the move.
Miller will be based in New York and drive News Corp.'s digital strategy across assets such as the MySpace social network, The Wall Street Journal, Fox networks, the 20th Century Fox movie studio, and the Hulu video site, which News Corp. co-owns with General Electric Co.'s NBC Universal and Providence Equity Partners.
An announcement is expected this week. The person knowledgeable about Miller's impending hiring spoke Monday on condition of anonymity, confirming earlier reports about Miller, because the deal had not been completed. Miller did not return a call seeking comment.
Miller will likely start before the end of June, which marks the departure of News Corp. President Peter Chernin, the No. 2 behind billionaire chief executive Rupert Murdoch, the company's controlling shareholder.
Miller is to report directly to Murdoch. Peter Levinsohn, president of Fox Interactive Media, which houses MySpace, is expected to move over to the TV and movie studio side.
Miller was instrumental in transforming AOL into a company dependent on advertising, a field that all media conglomerates are trying to master online with mixed results.
In his four-plus years as chairman and chief executive of AOL, Miller made key acquisitions, including Advertising.com for $435 million in 2004, and a crucial decision to shed AOL's roots in dial-up Internet access and give away content once reserved for paying subscribers.
