Vice Media hires NBCU alum as chief exec

Cuba Pictures owner Vice Media has hired former NBCUniversal exec Adam Stotsky as its chief exec, with incumbent Bruce Dixon leaving the company.

Stotsky spent almost 20 years at NBCU, latterly as president of E! Entertainment and Esquire Network, before moving to Dick Clark Productions and most recently OBB Media.

Dixon had been in sole charge of the embattled media company since December 2023, when co-founder Hozefa Lokhandwala stepped down.

Stotsky told the Wall Street Journal, which broke news of his appointment, that he wanted to focus on “storytelling that can build a long-term, profitable and sustainable media brand in today’s landscape”.

Vice has been in bullish form of late following a tumultuous five years.

The company acquired McMafia producer Cuba Pictures earlier this year in a deal that saw the production firm becoming a label within Vice Studios, led by Jamie Hall and Danny Gabai, who both took up their roles following a restructuring last year.

The Cuba deal marked the latest development for Vice Media, which also recently struck a distribution deal with ITV Studios recently and acquired London Alley Entertainment, combining it with Gangs of London prodco Pulse Films to create a commercial and music video production studio.

That came after the company had filed for bankruptcy and was sold to a debtholder consortium in a £275m deal in 2023.

It then restructured its global operations resulting in redundancies and is now owned by Fortress Investment Group, Soros Capital Management and Monroe Capital.

Vice Media consists of its studios arm, which produces TV, docs, film and digital series, as well as ad agency Virtue, channel operation Vice TV, and Vice Commercials and Branded Entertainment. It also has a joint venture with Savage Ventures to manage Vice brand digital channels.