New quarter, new CEOs

MobiTV, Acision and Handmark all kicked off the beginning of the fourth quarter on Monday with new CEOs. MobiTV claimed former Thomson Corp. President Charles Nooney for its top job, while Acision crowned former Ericsson exec Rory Buckley and Handmark brought aboard former Sprint vice president Paul Reddick.

MobiTV named Nooney to replace outgoing CEO Phillip Alvelda, the pioneering mobile content provider’s founding CEO. MobiTV officials said that MobiTV is evolving from a start-up to significant content player in the wireless space and needed a CEO with more experience in media to transition MobiTV between those stages. Alvelda will remain on MobiTV’s board and will keep his “visionary” role within the company, a spokesman said, but it’s not clear whether he’ll remain chairman of the board after Nooney officially takes the reins on Oct. 15.

Nooney’s background is definitely focused more on the television and new media side, rather than mobile. Nooney served as president of Technicolor Network Services, a global consultancy for Thomson, where he advised a long list of huge media brands, from BBC Worldwide to Disney, on the preparation, management and distribution of their content for new media platforms. But it was Nooney’s previous job running Premier Retail Networks—which was acquired by Thomson—that gives him his foundation for dealing with the new mobile TV space, Nooney said. PRM ran the country’s largest in-store television network, broadcasting targeted content to customers shopping at Wal-Mart, Best Buy, CostCo and many other outlets.

“I found there are a lot of similarities between what MobiTV is doing and PRN,” he said. “They’re both doing retail media on a large scale.” The major difference is the size of screen, he added. While he’s still learning the ropes of MobiTV, he said he already grasps the potential of the mobile medium for the mass-scale delivery of content. “From my standpoint I find an incredible attractiveness to the mobile device and the use of content on mobile devices for the simple reason you can carry them around with you 24-hours a day.”

Acision’s new CEO Buckley is an Ericsson veteran heading several regional divisions including as stint of president and head of northeast Asia. Acision, the former telecom division of LogicaCMG said his predecessor Chris McDermott was leaving to pursue other opportunities. In a statement the company said McDermott joined Acision originally hired to turn LogicaCMG’s telecom group into a high-value with the aim of a future sale. In 2007 he accomplished that task when Atlantic Bridge and Access Industries agreed to take the unit private for $525 million, changing the name of the newly separated company to Acision.

“Having achieved his goal, Chris is leaving Acision for a new challenge after he has a well deserved rest to refresh himself,” Acision said in a statement. “We wish him well and thank him for his valuable contributions.”

Mobile content and media company Handmark is bringing in Reddick, former Sprint vice president of partner development and product innovation, to take over for outgoing CEO and company founder August Grasis, who will transition to chairman of the board. Grasis will remain an active chairman, engaging with partners, but seems to have no problem passing the executive responsibilities off to the industry veteran Reddick.

“The most rewarding part of being an entrepreneur is taking the business to the next level and watching it take wings,” Grasis said in a statement. “Paul is the right person to realize my vision and propel our business forward on a global scale.”