2
PRESS RELEASES 35
April 17, 2007
Corbis Announces New Leadership Team
Corbis President Gary Shenk has appointed nine executives to his new leadership team as he transitions to the role of CEO. The new Executive Team, made up of senior leaders from across the organization and including a new head of sales and acting head of marketing, will support Shenk and his plan for continued revenue growth and market leadership.
The nine Executive Team members are Ivan Purdie, Kate Nickerson, Ross Sutherland, Stephen Gillett, Adam Brotman, Steve Lodis, Sue McDonald, Mark Sherman and Jim Mitchell. Corbis Chairman Bill Gates announced earlier this month that Shenk will take over the role of CEO from long-time leader, Steve Davis, effective July 1, 2007.
"This team represents fresh leadership for Corbis and is loaded with proven performers and team players who all want to win, make a real difference and believe in a great future for Corbis. I am very proud that everyone on my new team comes from within Corbis and has a proven track record of success at the company," said Gary Shenk, President, Corbis. "It is an exciting time for Corbis. This new team will be completely committed to delivering the highest level of service and support for our clients who depend on Corbis to bring their creative work to life."
The new leaders and promotions include:
- Ivan Purdie named to the Executive Team and promoted to Senior Vice President, Sales, with responsibility for all sales teams and activities worldwide. Purdie, who had been directing Corbis' EMEA sales operations, replaces Wil Merritt, who will be leaving the company.
- Kate Nickerson, Vice President, Marketing, named to the Executive Team and assuming the role of overseeing marketing globally on an interim basis, while a formal search is conducted. Nickerson has been at Corbis for more than seven years, most recently as Vice President of Integrated Marketing, and replaces David Bradley, who will also be leaving Corbis.
- Ross Sutherland, Chief Creative Officer, named to the Executive Team with responsibility for managing Corbis' directors of photography and their teams, for creative and editorial photography, and motion, on a global basis.
- Stephen Gillett, VP, Technology, named to the Executive Team with responsibility for managing Corbis' global technology activities.
- Adam Brotman named to the Executive Team and promoted to VP, Networks, overseeing all of Corbis' websites, including Corbis.com, Outline, Motion, and the company's microstock offering to be announced later this quarter.
- Steve Lodis, VP, Human Resources, named to Executive Team with responsibility for overseeing attracting and retaining industry-leading talent.
The remaining members named to the Executive Team are veteran leaders of the company:
- Sue McDonald, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer, maintaining responsibility for oversight of Finance, Media Services and Office Operations.
- Mark Sherman, Senior Vice President, Creative Resources, maintaining responsibility for the fastest growing division of Corbis' business including its industry-leading Rights Services group.
- Jim Mitchell, Senior Vice President and General Counsel, maintaining responsibility for legal activities and Business Development.
"In the past few years, Corbis has strategically invested in acquiring and creating the best pictures, built the most comprehensive rights services offering and expanded our presence and brand globally," said Shenk. "This new team will take Corbis to a new level by making us a more nimble organization committed to best serving our customers and growing our business."
ANP Photo Iintroduces Fair Trade Photography
ANP Photo introduces a brand new collection of stock photos, called World Portraits.
This worldwide and unique initiative enables models to earn money with their photos, every time their image is published. In second and third world countries, models receive their money by means of micro banking facilities or as a cheque.
The people that are portrayed are not professional models, but ordinary people who sign a model release contract on the spot. In doing so they agree in the use of their photo for any kind of publication purpose.
The idea of World Portraits is that in Western countries, it's common that models sign a model release and receive money for their job. In other parts of the world, people are portrayed at least as often. Their image can be found on calendars, postcards, billboards, in books, travel brochures and magazines. But they don't know about it, let alone receive any money. World Portraits changes this issue.
Dutch Princess Máxima recently launched World Portraits in the Museon in The Hague, where she also visited an exhibition of the collection. This exhibition will travel through The Netherlands in the next months.
With World Portraits, depicting people of around the world in their every-day routine, ANP Photo shows how businesses can put fair trade and ethical issues at the heart of what they are doing.
The collection can be seen at www.world-portraits.com. All World Portraits photos can be ordered and downloaded at the usual rates at www.anp-photo.com.
World Portraits is being supported by the DOEN Foundation. DOEN supports the concept of World Portraits because it considers portrait right as a basic right that human beings have. The DOEN Foundation thinks it is time that this right is organised for all people, also for people living in developing countries.
Since 1946 ANP has added to it's database of millions of news and stock photos on a daily basis. These pictures are available at www.anp-photo.com. Images are available for professional picture users worldwide. For further information please contact: Iris van Rijn at info@world-portraits.com or telephone +31 651 826129.
ASMP, EP, Nielsen Reach Accord On Photo/Artist License Agreement
Nielsen Business Media (formerly VNU Business Media, Inc.), The American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) and Editorial Photographers (EP) announced that they have reached accord on a new Nielsen Photographer/Artist License agreement. The new contract provides greater flexibility in the distribution, sales and licensing of Nielsen Business Media publications, while meeting the distinct needs of the company's contributing artists and photographers.
ASMP, EP and Nielsen, which publishes Photo District News (PDN) magazine, worked closely together to create this revised contract, an update to an existing Photographer/artist agreement, to better reflect the priorities of each party. The new agreement allows Nielsen to serve its customers' growing desire to receive its publications' content on multiple platforms, while providing compensation to photographers and illustrators for expanded usage of their work on
these platforms.
Lauren Wendle, the publisher of PDN, who was instrumental in working with all parties to create the new contract said, "We value the exceptional work and creativity that our photo partners bring to our publications -- not just for PDN, a showcase for the photography business, but for all Nielsen publications. I'm pleased that we were able to reach common ground on an agreement that respects the contributions of freelance artists. It's a win-win situation for everyone."
Eugene Mopsik, Executive Director of ASMP, said, "We deeply appreciate Nielsen's sensitivity to the needs of photographers and its willingness to come to a mutual agreement. We hope that this will serve as a model for other publishers."
Brian Smith, President of Editorial Photographers, said, "This contract is proof that it's possible to address the needs of publishers, yet at the same time offer a contract that is fair to freelance photographers and artists."
Among the specific changes are:
- Standard use rights are more clearly defined.
- The contract provides for a prepaid supplemental 15% fee to cover
expanded usage of the images, such as when Nielsen publications are
supplied to database content aggregators and editorial licensees of
Nielsen content.
- The agreement does not convey usage rights retroactively; it covers
only uses going forward.
- Promotional reprint rights are separate, and fees for using images
in reprints will be negotiated case by case between the photographer
or artist and the reprint vendor.
In addition, the agreement no longer calls for photo and art contributors to indemnify Nielsen in the event of a third-party lawsuit. Instead, it provides that contributors will cooperate fully with Nielsen if a lawsuit involving an image is brought against the
company.
The Nielsen Company is a global information and media company with leading market positions and recognized brands in marketing information (ACNielsen), media information (Nielsen Media Research), business publications (Billboard, The Hollywood Reporter, Adweek), trade shows and the newspaper sector (Scarborough Research). The
privately held company has more than 42,000 employees and is active in more than 100 countries, with headquarters in Haarlem, the Netherlands, and New York, USA. For more information, please visit, www.nielsen.com.
Corbis Enhances Offering To Better Serve Interactive and Mobile Markets
Corbis today announced industry-leading Rights Managed (RM) licensing enhancements and a new RM and Royalty-Free (RF) Backgrounds & Objects collection to better serve the needs of marketing and editorial professionals creating online and mobile campaigns and editorial content. The innovations are already making it faster, easier and more cost-effective for creative professionals at leading interactive advertising agencies such as Digitas as well as corporations and media companies to obtain the visual content they need to bring their ideas to life.
Corbis is adding new packaged options to its existing RM licensing model to streamline licensing content for advertising and broadcast channels associated with the Internet, incorporating Web-only video commercials, Webisodes and mobile device advertisements. In addition, Corbis is combining traditional television commercial usage with web and mobile uses so advertisers can more cost-effectively extend broadcast campaigns to the Internet and mobile devices.
"In the past, when we wanted to license a 'hero' image for broadcast as well as interactive use, we would most likely have to have two sets of RM licenses," said Lisa Oropallo, Associate Director of Art Buying, Digitas. "These new enhancements make it easier for us to extend the use of an image from broadcast campaigns to the Internet, saving us both time and money."
Corbis is also introducing a rich and diverse RM and Royalty Free (RF) Objects & Backgrounds collection created for online advertising, marketing and editorial use. It is a centralized easy-to-search collection of more than 30,000 images of common objects and backgrounds typically used for e-cards, screen savers and web décor including metaphors, backgrounds and galleries. It is a conceptual collection with a wide variety of both creative execution and subject matters. The imagery is clean, often on white backgrounds, with subject matter that is easy to cut out and quickly add on a webpage or in a small size. Corbis will continue to add thousands of new images on a quarterly basis.
"The advertising and media industries are transforming rapidly, and Corbis has been working closely with creative and editorial professionals to understand their emerging needs," said Gary Shenk, President, Corbis. "We are committed to being at the forefront of innovation, and we've carefully tailored these offerings to ensure we're providing creative professionals with the right imagery and pricing that they need to succeed."