Sony Pictures Digital Studios president, Kenneth Williams, has been named the new CEO and president of Stan Lee Media. Subsequently, Stan Lees acting president and CEO, Devendra Mishra, will become the president of Stan Lee International, overseeing partnerships with multimedia companies around the world. Since 1997, Williams has overseen all activities at Sony Pictures Digital. In addition, Williams is one of the founders of Sony Pictures Imageworks, the Academy award-nominated digital effects and animation division of the company. Williams also headed Sony Pictures Studios digital post-production facilities, Sony Pictures High Definition Center, Sonys DVD Authoring Center, digital media management and the physical distribution of Sony Pictures filmed entertainment library across all media. Williams came to Sony through their purchase of Columbia Pictures, where he began his tenure in 1982. At Columbia, Williams began as director of corporate financing. Prior to Columbia, he worked at Chase Manhattan Bank in the motion picture lending group. Williams said of his new appointment, "I am thrilled to accept this new challenge and to help build the brand value of Stan Lee Media and its growing roster of animation franchises into a global digital Hollywood studio. The unique character-driven franchises created by Stan and his team, and co-created with other globally popular entertainment franchises, are enabled by some of the most sophisticated production and distribution technology on the Web. This positions the company to create a value chain of renewable characters and content which can be exploited in a wide variety of traditional and non-traditional media, merchandising and licensing." Stan Lee, co-founder and chief creative officer of Stan Lee Media, said, "The addition of Ken to our team is a milestone not only for Stan Lee Media but the Internet industry at large. One of Hollywoods most respected digital convergence executives, Ken brings wealth of experience and a track record for building technology enabled enterprises. His Wall Street background, combined with his experience in negotiating domestic and international transactions and strategic relationships make him ideally suited to position Stan Lee Media as a premiere, Internet-based globally branded content creation and production company."
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
