Veteran locally-based, digital TV network executive Jonathan
Katz has been named chief operating officer and head of entertainment for E.W.Scripps’ new national television networks business.
Katz will oversee the
networks’ entertainment brands including Bounce, Laff, Grit, Court TV Mystery, as well as the ION networks, Brown Sugar, a companion SVOD service to Bounce, and Scripps’ national
syndicated program “The List.”Katz founded Katz Broadcasting, a company of locally based digital TV networks, and then sold the company to Scripps in 2017 for $292
million.
He started the Bounce network in 2011, with a focus on African-American audiences. Three years later, he founded the Katz Networks brand (under Katz Broadcasting LLC) in 2014,
where he was president and chief executive officer of the Katz networks.
Katz expanded the business to several niche-targeted, over-the-air networks. The most recent was the
revival of national TV cable network brand Court TV in 2019, with the development of true crime-content channel Court TV Mystery.
Before starting the Katz networks, Katz was
senior vice president ant general manager of program planning and acquisitions for all of the Turner Entertainment Networks.
Before working for Turner, he was vice
president of marketing for CNN Newsource.advertisement
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Katz also held a number of local TV positions at TV stations in Tampa-St. Petersburg, Florida; Charlotte, North Carolina; Birmingham,
Alabama, and Tuscaloosa, Alabama.