December 1, 2008

CableFAX: 4. Roto Tom: Tom Rutledge

Tom Rutledge
Title: COO, Cablevision
Last Year: #7
Age: 54
Education: California U, BA, Economics; Harvard U, advanced management program

Why Him? Who is afraid of the Big Bad FiOS? Not Rutledge, with his team consistently putting up impressive results. Sanford Bernstein notes three years after Verizon’s FiOS introduction, Cablevision has grown video subs by 3.4%. Despite high penetration in service offerings, Rutledge keeps finding ways to eke out more subs. And what’s more, he’s no longer just traditional cable operations. Besides cable, there’s Rainbow (need we mention the success it has seen in the past year?), News 12, Rainbow Ad Sales — and now he’s running a major metropolitan newspaper, Newsday. Maybe this is the guy who can save the newspaper industry by coming up with a new model that will stop the bloodbath. No pressure, Tom.

Proud Moment: Surpassing 90% digital video penetration in Q3. Can anyone catch them?

Year Ahead:
Cablevision plans to launch its remote storage DVR next year, but programmers and studios have asked the Supreme Court to hear why they think the technology infringes on their copyrights. It’s not just Cablevision’s plans that hinge on the decision — but the entire industry’s.

AM

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