Ingenious taps former Sky chief Tony Ball as chair to lead AIM listing

by Sam Matthews, Brand Republic 06-Feb-06, 14:50

LONDON – Media investment fund Ingenious Media has appointed Tony Ball, the former Sky chief executive, as chairman ahead of its £250m flotation on the stock market next month.

Ball, BSkyB chief executive from 1999 to 2003, will join the board of directors at the Guernsey-based company set up by Patrick McKenna, former head of media and entertainment at Deloitte & Touche in the 1980s.

Prior to heading Sky, Ball was president and CEO of Fox/Liberty Networks in the US. He is now chairman of Kabel Deutschland, as well as a director at BAA and Sky Italia.

In addition, former Merill Lynch research head Neil Blackley has been appointed as non-executive director of Ingenious. Blackley was head of the UK and European media research team at Merrill Lynch from 1996 to 2003. He is also a chairman of the Apax media advisory board.

Ingenious Media manages over £3bn of media investment funds and was one of the fastest-growing UK companies in 1997.

Last year, the company advised the independent production companies Shed and RDF Media on their flotations and brokered the sale of 'American Idol' owner 19 Entertainment to CKX, the entertainment giant being set up by US media entrepreneur Bob Sillerman.

McKenna said: "Understanding the media landscape is the key to successful investing for Ingenious Media, and their wealth of experience of the international media scene makes them very appropriate additions to the Ingenious Media board."

He added that this was an opportune time for investment in progressive media companies and Ingenious Media hoped to benefit from technological and regulatory changes, as well as shifting patterns of consumer behaviour in the media sector.

Ingenious Media's future strategy will be to generate returns for its shareholders.

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