FremantleMedia has promoted Gary Carter to the newly created position of chief creative officer, new platforms. In his new role, Carter, who was previously senior EVP for worldwide entertainment, will be responsible for the creation of new brands and concepts for platforms such as mobile, broadband, game consoles and IPTV. He will lead his own team of development executives and will also work closely with executives in FremantleMedia Licensing Worldwide (FLW) who are responsible for exploiting the company's brands across multimedia channels: he has actually been named acting CEO of FLW, following the appointment of Simon Spalding to director of operations, Asia Pacific. In addition, he will work with third-party developers to acquire formats that can be repurposed for new platforms. He will be based in London and Amsterdam. Carter has worked in FremantleMedia's Worldwide Entertainment division since January, 2005; he began working with the company as a consultant in August, 2003. His resume also includes stints as executive director of program affairs for Endemol Entertainment International, and as international business manager for Planet 24 Productions.
In other FremantleMedia news:
- The company has licensed the rights to Sky to create an interactive TV game based on the classic gameshow, "Strike it Rich." It says that the game, which is currently in development, will replicate the show's format and is expected to launch later this year.
- The company says that the cross-platform interactive elements, with which it enhanced the second series of "The X Factor," proved successful. It claims that the official X Factor Web site received an average of 26,000 visitors per day, with over 2.4 million unique users visiting the site throughout the duration of the series. The site featured mobile downloads such as SMS and MMS news and gossip updates, a Java game, betting provided by Paddy Power, and a mobile phone video portal that offered viewers access to behind-the-scenes footage and a competition. FremantleMedia says that the X Factor message board was the most popular ever associated with a program on the ITV network, averaging 12,000 posts per week. The show's SMS, red-button and fixed-line voting services note: the services were managed by Harvest Media Group), meanwhile, generated 10.8 million votes during the live finale alone. FremantleMedia says that the Mobile Interactive Group's "Votewinner" SMS voting platform processed 1,300 messages per second.
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