Sky Studios ups Jane Millichip to oversee operations across Europe

Jane Millichip

Comcast-owned Sky Studios has expanded the remit of its UK chief content officer Jane Millichip, who is taking control of creative operations across Europe.

Millichip will now oversee all editorial and content activities in the UK and on the continent for Sky Studios, with the division’s chiefs in Germany and Italy – Marcus Ammon and Nils Hartmann respectively – reporting into her.

The new role is the latest in a series of promotions for Millichip, who was named chief commercial officer at Sky Studios when the UK-based production operation was launched in June 2019, following Comcast’s acquisition of Sky from 21st Century Fox.

I Hate Suzie

She was then promoted to become chief content officer for Sky Studios in the UK a year later, gaining responsibility for all UK editorial activities at Sky Studios, including in-house and indie development, plus the division’s commercial activities such as deficit funding and production partnerships.

Prior to Sky Studios, Millichip was MD of distributor Sky Vision, which was merged into NBCU Global Distribution in October 2019. Her latest promotion comes four months since it emerged Sky Studios CEO Gary Davey would be retiring later this year.

‘Evolutionary move’

In a note to staff, Davey described the appointment as an “evolution of Sky Studios” and said it would strengthen ties across the company, following the international success of shows such as the UK’s I Hate Suzie and Gangs Of London, Sky Italia’s ZeroZeroZero and Sky Deutschland’s Das Boot.

“Though our original content slate will continue to serve our 24 million customers with unique, local content made for them in each market, we are today bringing our content teams even closer together with the appointment of Jane Millichip as chief content officer for Sky Studios across the Group.

Gary Davey

“Last year, Jane took on responsibility for Sky Studios content teams in the UK, in addition to her commercial responsibilities. Effective today, Marcus Ammon and Nils Hartmann, our Sky Studios leadership in Germany and Italy, will report to Jane.

“Marcus and Nils are both exceptional talents, deeply respected by the industry and with strong creative instincts; understanding what our customers want and value, both in Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia, and across the Group.

“They have each built strong teams as well as bold and creatively ambitious slates.”

Davey added that the organisation would enable Sky to “respond quicker to customer demands, identify new, creative opportunities across Group and work even more closely to deliver content to Sky UK, Italia and Deutschland, working to the briefs set out by [UK MD of content] Zai [Bennett], [Italy content chief] Nicola [Maccanico] and [EVP of content in Germany] Elke [Walthelm].”