HOST & SPONSORS
Enders Analysis provides market intelligence and advisory covering the media, entertainment, mobile and fixed telecommunications industries in Europe. We cover all sides of the market, from consumers and leading companies (e.g. Vodafone, ITV, BT, Sky, Virgin Media, Apple, Google and others), to regulation. Today, Enders Analysis offers its subscribers research generated by a programme covering the major commercial, regulatory and strategic issues in mobile and fixed line telecoms, TV and the Internet, as well as the major content businesses such as music, publishing and advertising. Our focus is on the European markets but we assess all key trends and regulatory issues in our sectors in major markets such as the US or Japan. Our research is independent, impartial and grounded in analysis.
They seek us out when decisive leadership is key and experience is vital. When results are measured in days but their impact endures for months and years to come. When they need the advice and support of people who have been there rather than slideware.
At AlixPartners, speed to results at defining moments is in our DNA. A propensity to action is an integral part of every single person’s make-up at our firm—in fact it is something we specifically screen for whenever we recruit. Clients rely on us and our cross-functional teams to deliver results that last, at pace.
We're global, we operate in all key industry sectors, and we offer an extensive range of best-in-class consulting services.
In the face of disruption, we get to the point and we get things done. When it really matters.
Adobe is the global leader in digital media and digital marketing solutions. Our creative, marketing and document solutions empower everyone – from emerging artists to global brands – to bring digital creations to life and deliver immersive, compelling experiences to the right person at the right moment for the best results. In short, Adobe is everywhere, and we’re changing the world through digital experiences.
Warner Bros. Discovery is a leading global media and entertainment company that creates and distributes the world’s most differentiated and complete portfolio of content and brands across television, film and streaming. Warner Bros. Discovery inspires, informs and entertains audiences worldwide through its iconic brands and products including: Discovery Channel, HBO Max, discovery+, CNN, DC, Eurosport, HBO, HGTV, Food Network, OWN, Investigation Discovery, TLC, Magnolia Network, TNT, TBS, truTV, Travel Channel, Animal Planet, Science Channel, Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group, Warner Bros. Television Group, Warner Bros. Pictures Animation, Warner Bros. Games, New Line Cinema, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, Turner Classic Movies, Discovery en Español, Hogar de HGTV and others.
https://www.wbd.com/
The Financial Times is one of the world’s leading news organisations, recognised internationally for its authority, integrity and accuracy. The FT has a record paying readership of 1.6mn, while the wider FT Group has a global paying audience of 3mn across its portfolio of journalism, products and services.
Thorold Barker
Thorold Barker is a Senior Adviser to AlixPartners. He sits on the board of Moelis & Co and Tiger 21 in New York City and is a regular speaker and moderator - having appeared on stage at big global events including Davos, Web Summit, and the Future Investment Initiative. His live interviews have included Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Christine Lagarde, Rishi Sunak, David Attenborough, Satya Nadella, Ana Botin, Ryan Reynolds, Antony Blinken, Olaf Sholz, Steve Schwartzman, Mark Carney.
Thorold is the former Editor for Europe, Middle East and Africa at the Wall Street Journal, where he was also the masthead editor overseeing all global events and live Journalism. Before joining the Wall Street Journal in 2008, to recreate the paper’s Heard on the Street Column, he was U.S. Lex Editor for the Financial Times in New York. Thorold started his career as a strategy consultant at Bain & Co and has a degree in Modern Languages from Trinity College, Cambridge.
Andrew Georgiou
President & MD UK & Ireland and Sports EMEA, Warner Bros. Discovery
As President and MD for Warner Bros. Discovery UK and Ireland, Andrew leads the business, which includes multiple TV channel brands; Discovery, TLC, Quest, Quest Red, Really, Cartoon Network, Eurosport and TNT Sports. He also oversees the consumer products, home entertainment, TV licensing, digital distribution and affiliate sales in the UK and Ireland and supports the local Warner Bros. theatrical business. Andrew was recently responsible for the launch of HBO Max in the UK&I and he is now also leading HBO Max and discovery+ across EMEA for Warner Bros. Discovery.
As President and MD for Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) Sports Europe, Andrew oversees WBD Sports’ businesses, brands and properties including TNT Sports in the UK & Ireland, Eurosport and the Olympic Games across Europe, as well as responsibility for the organisation's Events management and promotion division.
Joining the company in 2019, Andrew arrived from Lagardère Sports and Entertainment where he was the CEO.
Andrew is also a member of the Board of Sports United Against Dementia, part of the Alzheimer’s Society in the UK, helping raise awareness as well as funding for research and to support those suffering from dementia.
Gerhard Zeiler, President, International, WBD
Gerhard Zeiler serves as President of International for Warner Bros. Discovery. Zeiler has strategic oversight for the company’s brands and joint responsibility for direct-to-consumer in more than 220 international markets. He is also responsible for local theatrical production and acquisitions, as well as managing the country and region-specific networks and businesses in Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific.
Appointed President of WarnerMedia International in 2020, Zeiler added responsibility for Discovery Inc.’s significant international footprint following the close of the Discovery-WarnerMedia merger in April 2022. He first joined Turner in 2012 as President, Turner International, where he oversaw the entertainment and kids’ networks in all markets outside of North America, working with core global brands on local and regional channels.
Prior to joining Turner, Zeiler was CEO of RTL Group, a division of German conglomerate Bertelsmann and Europe’s largest television production and broadcast company. Under his leadership, RTL expanded its international footprint, bringing hit competition shows like Idols and Got Talent to the U.S. market and growing its holdings to 41 channels and 34 radio stations across 10 countries.
Among his many professional honours, Austrian-born Zeiler is the first non-American to receive NATPE’s prestigious Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award in 2011.
Chloe Clements is Managing Director for Telco, Media & Services and Travel & Hospitality at Adobe UKI
Chloe Clements is Managing Director for Telco, Media & Services and Travel & Hospitality at Adobe UKI, where she leads industry strategy and commercial growth across some of the most rapidly evolving sectors in the TMT landscape.
With over a decade of experience in enterprise technology, Chloe has built her career at the intersection of technology, media, and data, working with global organisations to navigate the commercial and operational shifts reshaping their industries. Prior to Adobe, she spent eleven years at SAP, where she held a series of leadership roles spanning industry sales, SaaS growth, and strategic operations.
Chloe is a passionate advocate for the role of AI-powered experience technology in reshaping customer engagement across telecoms, media, and tech, and brings both strategic depth and frontline commercial experience to every conversation.
Claire Enders CBE, CEO, Enders Analysis
Claire Enders, CBE is the founder of Enders Analysis, the leading British independent research company of the creative industries, broadcast economy and digital exploitation models. Enders Analysis supports 140 plus UK charities including the NSPCC and the Dundee V&A Design Museum. She led a media and fundraising initiative that saved the London Zoological Society during the pandemic. Her current focus is The Multibanks, an anti-waste Commonwealth Initiative begun by Gordon Brown. In 2016 Claire was made a Fellow of the Royal Television Society for her significant contribution to television. In June 2024 Claire was awarded the Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for services to Media in His Majesty the King’s Birthday Honours List. Claire is a graduate of Yale and of the London Business School.
Karen Egan, Managing Director, Telecoms, Enders Analysis
Karen is a Head of Telecoms covering telecoms companies and has more than twenty years of experience in the industry, initially as a regulator at the European Commission, followed by seven years of telecoms consulting with PwC in Europe and Asia and as an Equities Analyst in the City, including six years leading the number one ranked telecoms research team at Lehman Brothers. Karen holds an MA in Economics from Trinity College, Dublin.
Eric Benedict, Executive Partner & MD, AlixPartners
Eric is an experienced turnaround and performance improvement professional with both advisory and line management experience. Clients benefit from Eric's work with the financial sponsors, boards of directors, and managements of their companies because he can quickly diagnose opportunities to improve performance and then work hands-on to rapidly improve operating and financial results. Eric has been involved extensively across such business sectors as telco, technology, and business services. His clients include public limited companies and leading private-equity firms, and he has also chaired several private-equity-backed technology businesses. Prior to joining AlixPartners, Eric was with Alvarez & Marsal, Ernst & Young, and RSM Rhodes.
Relevant experience
- Developed improvement plan for major business-to-business software provider with substantial offshored and outsourced development activities; renegotiated customer contracts and overhauled bids and sales pipeline management processes; reorganized product management and development functions; rationalized product portfolio; supported implementation alongside management for 12 months.
- Undertook operational due diligence for sponsor seeking to carve out Pan-European online advertising business and identified 25% cost efficiency opportunities in selling, general, and administrative expenses functions.
- For a sponsor, co-led pre- and post-acquisition support of major technology hardware and services business to identify and realize multibillion-dollar cost take-out.
- Retained by board of quoted US/UK B2B Technology Group which had received hostile bid. Led a team to identify a turnaround plan for US-based unit, resulting in $50-million increase in performance of earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization.
Mark Endemaño, Partner & Managing Director, AlixPartners
Mark has 25 years of wide-ranging experience in the media, entertainment, and technology sectors as a management consultant, advisor, and operator. Served as chief financial officer (CFO) at Walt Disney Company Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) and as general manager of media distribution at Walt Disney International. Most recently he was CEO of a tech company, delivering motion capture and augmented reality software to digital content creators and developing animation infrastructure for the metaverse. Mark’s clients benefit from his deep expertise in the areas of digital business transformation, digital rights management, finance transformation, value delivery, data analytics, new-business-model creation, and postmerger integration and synergy.
Mark has a Bachelor of Science (Hons) in economics with accountancy from Loughborough University.
Relevant experience
- Served as CEO of a next-generation motion capture, 3D animation, and augmented-reality software company for digital content creators; developed an artificial intelligence motion-capture platform-as-a-service offering and negotiated a multiyear enterprise contract with a world-leading video games company.
- Served as general manager of media distribution at Walt Disney International; led negotiations of long-term strategic digital rights deals, including Sky, Netflix, Apple, Amazon, M6 (France), ProSieben, RAI (Italy), and MultiChoice (Africa); delivered x5 growth in branded digital services; planned Disney+ international launch.
- As CFO of Walt Disney Company EMEA, partnered with president EMEA to drive deep transformation of One Disney local go-to-market strategy; led integrated supply chain review and optimization; co-led post acquisition integration of Marvel and Lucasfilm; led implementation of franchise management business information system; implemented accounting shared-services organization; designed and implemented program to deliver $200 million in annual recurring-cost savings.
- Led international business transformation programs for two global media and entertainment companies in home entertainment and television distribution businesses.
Stuart Cockburn, Partner, AlixPartners
Stuart is a Partner at AlixPartners, with a focus on advising and supporting clients to improve performance through major transformations, turnarounds and their most critical operational change programs.
Stuart typically works with infrastructure businesses and over a 20+ year career, Stuart has worked with a range of companies in the sector, including digital infrastructure (towers, fiber, satellite, broadcast), public transport and water utilities.
Clients benefit from Stuart's experience and ability to work and partner with management teams of both corporate and private equity / infrastructure fund owned businesses, as well as their boards when required.
This experience is derived from both senior industry experience and significant international consulting experience. As a consultant Stuart has previously worked at Booz & Company and in industry he has held senior executive roles at a number of infrastructure businesses. Before joining AlixPartners Stuart held executive board positions at Arqiva, the then UK Broadcast, Mobile Towers and Satellite business as well as Arriva plc., the European public transport operator.
Nathan Hancock, General Manager and Managing Director
Adobe Digital Experience Solutions & Strategic Initiatives, Adobe
Nathan Hancock is the Vice President and Managing Director for Adobe UK, Ireland, Middle East, and Africa (UKI/MEA). Adobe is one of the largest and most diversified software companies in the world, with a mission to empower everyone to create. Across the UKI/MEA region, Nathan’s leadership delivers on that mission, with the team serving a large customer base spanning business, creative and marketing professionals at the world’s largest enterprises.
A seasoned technology executive, he has held enterprise leadership go-to-market roles at Microsoft, Pegasystems, and Digital.ai. Nathan is a customer-centric, people-focused leader and is known for building high-performing teams and driving strategic partnerships that accelerate business transformation and customer value. He holds an MBA from the University of Texas at Dallas and a bachelor’s degree from Washington State University.
Dan Thomas, Global Media Editor, Financial Times
Daniel Thomas is the Global Media Editor for the FT. He was previously the chief UK business correspondent, executive news editor, deputy companies editor, telecoms correspondent and head of the Technology, Media and Telecoms team in London, property correspondent and FT Money reporter. He has worked for various titles covering property, advertising, finance and media.
Patrick Jenkins, Deputy Editor, Financial Times
Patrick Jenkins is deputy editor of the Financial Times. Before his appointment, Patrick served as financial editor for over five years, shaping FT’s overall financial coverage and managing several teams, including banking, markets and Lex.
Patrick joined the FT in 1998 and reported for FT Money and UK companies. He has been Frankfurt correspondent, Companies editor and Banking editor.