Aim:
Established first UK National News Media Partnership with Microsoft English Language News portals

What I did:
As the head of the Telegraph Licensing team, I engaged with Microsoft as a founding UK publisher to deliver a 'best-in-class' news experience on MSN English Language websites and Apps. Microsoft had previously delivered an aggregated news experience on their tiled Windows desktop, but this was mostly using agency sources, not recognised UK News brands - so this new model was an exciting opportunity to reach a new, engaged audience in particular in the UK and US. With responsibility for negotiating the commercial, rights and final look and feel of the 'distributed news experience', it was a great learning curve for me and the team around me. The essential balance was struck between developing partnerships that are both revenue-generating, audience growth opportunities, and providing a holistic consumer experience that was non-damaging to a growing direct subscriptions strategy. As well as learning how this balance could be successfully delivered in revenue-positive terms, I was also quickly thrown into effective stakeholder management between Commercial andEditorial. It broke down silos, led to an increasingly engaged communication approach between MSN and The Telegraph to ensure the relationship was seen as beneficial and not detrimental to our direct strategy. I was proud to have negotiated and delivered the Telegraph's first commercial news content partnership with Microsoft and for successfully concluding all contractual, technical and commercial elements of the deal and the ongoing business relationship.