News Corp parachutes in European TV boss as Brooks resigns


News Corp has installed Tom Mockridge as CEO of newspaper division News International following the resignation of Rebekah Brooks amid the ongoing phone-hacking scandal engulfing the company. Mockridge has been running Italian pay TV platform Sky Italia and, since 2008, has also been CEO of News Corp’s European TV operations.


Mockridge’s tenure in charge of Sky Italia has been marked by growth as well as several spats with Mediaset, the Berlusconi family controlled Italian commercial broadcaster. Prior to Sky Italia, he was chairman of Sky New Zealand, the News Corp-backed Kiwi pay TV platform and worked at News’ Asian pay TV unit Star. He has also served a three-year term as CEO of News Corp-backed Australian pay TV operator Foxtel.  


“Tom is an outstanding executive with unrivalled experience across our journalism and television businesses,” James Murdoch, deputy chief operating officer and chairman and CEO, International, News Corporation, said. “He has proven himself to be a very effective operator in his time at Sky Italia. Under his leadership, Sky has grown to become one of the world’s most successful pay TV businesses, reaching close to five million homes and launching channels like TG24 which has set a new standard for independent journalism in Italy.”


Murdoch added: “I believe that Tom is the best person to move the company forward to a brighter future.”


Mockridge steps into the role as the company’s newspaper division continues to be the centre of controversy around the alleged methods its journalists used to obtain stories. The crisis has become international this week as the US FBI said it would investigate whether transgressions along the same lines as those alleged to have taken place in the UK, occurred in the US.