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Viacom
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Brian Robbins gave his producer Brian Robbins the leadership of Nickelodeon, an initiative that shows how important the children's programming sector is for the media conglomerate.
Mr. Robbins is currently President of Paramount Players, a Viacom-based Paramount Pictures unit, specializing in content related to Viacom's major distribution channels such as BET, Nickelodeon and MTV. He has close ties to Paramount Pictures CEO Jim Gianopulos and Viacom General Manager Bob Bakish.
Prior to joining Paramount, Mr. Robbins founded Awesomeness, a content platform for the Generation Z audience. He was also co-founder of Tollin / Robbins Productions, whose credits included the long-running show "One Tree Hill "and the founder of Varsity Pictures, who has produced several shows for Nickelodeon.
Robbins has been appointed chairman of the Nickelodeon Group, a vacancy since June, when Cyma Zarghami stepped down after 12 years. Since then, Sarah Levy, chief operating officer of Viacom Media Networks, has been appointed interim chief of the Nickelodeon Group. Mr. Robbins will be based in Los Angeles.
In addition to the Nickelodeon flagship channel, the group includes Nick Jr., who addresses preschoolers, and TeenNick. Nickelodeon has long been the dominant children's programmer, but its ratings have declined in recent years, as the number of viewing options for children on wired and digital platforms, particularly at Netflix, has increased.
According to Nielsen, Nickelodeon has registered a decline of over 20% in ratings from a year ago in its key demographic group consisting of children aged 2 to 11 years. He also recently broke ties with producer Dan Schneider, who was a successful plant for the chain over the last three decades. His credits include "Henry Danger" and "iCarly".
Despite its challenges, Nickelodeon is Viacom's most successful cable channel. SpongeBob SquarePants, his hit hit for a long time, and his most-watched show right now is "Henry Danger".
In 2017, Nickelodeon generated $ 2.1 billion in revenue from advertising and distribution fees, and cash flow of more than $ 1 billion, according to Kagan's industrial consulting firm, S & D. P Global Market Intelligence. Viacom does not report the performance of each multimedia network.
Paramount Players was created a little over a year ago and has several films in production, including "Dora the Explorer" and "Rugrats", feature films based on the popular Nickelodeon show. Wyck Godfrey, the president of Paramount's film group, will head Paramount Players in the meantime as he conducts research on Robbins' successor, Viacom said.
Mr. Robbins debuted in the industry as an actor and he and Mr. Schneider performed in the ABC sitcom "Head of the Class" in the 1980s. Both were also production partners in the industry. "All That" show of Nickelodeon.
Write to Joe Flint at [email protected] and Keach Hagey at [email protected]
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