Paramount Skydance’s tech chief is stepping down as David Ellison’s digital transformation heats up.
Phil Wiser, Paramount’s chief tech officer, told his colleagues on Friday morning that he’s leaving at the end of May after seven years with the company.
“Writing this and sharing this news is harder than I expected,” Wiser said in his farewell memo, which was obtained by Business Insider.
Wiser said in his memo that he wasn’t retiring. A person familiar with the move said Wiser instead may look to work with tech startups. This person said Wiser’s decision to step down on May 29 was part of a planned transition.
“Phil has played a meaningful role in shaping our technology strategy during his time here,” said Dane Glasgow, Paramount’s chief product officer, in a follow-up email to staffers.
Glasgow credited Wiser for “advancing our technical and digital capabilities, all while helping to strengthen the technology foundations as we scaled our global direct-to-consumer business.”
Instead of hiring a new chief tech officer, Glasgow told employees that Wiser’s responsibilities will be divided among four executives who will report to him:
- Laksh Nathan, EVP and chief information officer
- Jim Harrison, EVP of infrastructure & media technology
- Frank Governale, SVP of production technology & operations
- Carlo Joseph, chief information security officer
Wiser joined the company in September 2018 after serving as the tech chief for Hearst and Sony. He saw plenty of change during his tenure, including the Viacom-CBS merger, a rebrand to Paramount, and the Paramount-Skydance tie-up — plus the COVID-19 pandemic.
“His leadership has further contributed to the modernization of our platforms and the integration of data and technology across our brands,” Glasgow said in his memo.
In his final missive to Paramount staffers, Wiser said that what he was “most grateful for is not the accomplishments — as remarkable as they are.”
“It is the people,” Wiser said. “The culture of this team. The way you solve hard problems together. The way you hold each other up through wave after wave of change and uncertainty. The way you have consistently shown what is possible when talented, good people commit to something. That is what I will carry with me.”
Paramount has embraced a “tech-forward” approach since Ellison became CEO last August. He’s told employees that “prioritizing investments in advanced technology and data capabilities” is the key to narrowing the gap with Netflix in the streaming space.
In recent months, Paramount+ has launched a short-form video feed and explored adding video podcasts and interactive elements like shopping features and sports stats.
Paramount is also combining the tech platforms for its namesake streamer and Pluto TV, its free streamer, in a process called “convergence” that involves bringing key tech teams together.
Ellison has made several crucial hires to expedite the 114-year-old media company’s tech transformation, including former Google exec Hugh Williams and Glasgow, who came over last fall from Meta.
Read Wiser’s full memo to employees here:
To my Paramount TECH team, Writing this and sharing this news is harder than I expected. After seven-plus years together, I have decided to leave Paramount. But before I do, what I most want to say — the only thing that really matters — is thank you. Thank you for showing up, every single day, through conditions that would have broken lesser teams. Thank you for:
- The late nights and the early mornings. For the problems you solved that no one ever saw, and the ones you fixed that kept the whole thing running and got none of the credit.
- Being relentlessly focused on the complete technology and service experience for our internal and external customers.
- Every integration meeting, every migration, every system failure at 2 a.m. that somehow you turned around by dawn.
- Not flinching when COVID hit — keeping our people safe and our voice on the air.
- Protecting the company diligently while building modern, AI-first cybersecurity capabilities.
- Doing whatever was needed to get that show on the air, that production asset delivered, or that promo to pop.
- Streaming all of those live events at record-breaking scale, starting with the Super Bowl in 2019, on infrastructure that was a fraction of what exists today.
- Rebuilding our entire media supply chain, ad tech ecosystem, licensing solutions, and more into genuinely best-in-class technology and operations platforms.
- Embracing the AI opportunity early and bringing others along to advance our capabilities.
- Giving us one final win together — Oracle Fusion in just 15 months, a feat almost no organization at our scale has pulled off.
While delivering on all of this for Paramount, you also kept innovation, technical excellence, and user experience at the forefront of our efforts. I saw all of it. Every bit of it. You set the company up for real success going forward. But what I am most grateful for is not the accomplishments — as remarkable as they are. It is the people. The culture of this team. The way you solve hard problems together. The way you hold each other up through wave after wave of change and uncertainty. The way you have consistently shown what is possible when talented, good people commit to something. That is what I will carry with me. The challenges coming down the road are real. The pace of change in technology, in AI, in how content is made and distributed — it is only accelerating. The work ahead will be demanding. None of that is new to this team. I want to be clear about something: you are exceptionally well-positioned for everything ahead of you. The foundation we built together — the infrastructure, the platforms, the operational discipline, the AI capabilities we put in place — is not just solid. It is a genuine competitive advantage. You have done the hard work. You know how to do this. As for me, I am heading back to my Silicon Valley tech roots to advance some ideas on enterprise AI. More to come on that at a later time. Needless to say, I remain energized and excited about the possibilities emerging in this AI revolution. Seven years. What a journey. It has been the honor of a lifetime to work alongside every one of you. And I will be cheering you on as I dive into what’s next. I am here through the end of May and hope to see many of you in the coming weeks to say farewell. You can always find me online — please stay in touch. Stay Scrappy! Phil
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