MTG appoints Aass as studio head
May 28, 2014
Modern Times Group (MTG), the international entertainment group, has announced the appointment of Morten Aass as President and CEO of Nice Entertainment Group (previously MTG Studios), which comprises MTG’s content businesses. Patrick Svensk, Chairman and CEO of Nice Entertainment Group and Executive Vice President of Content MTG, is leaving MTG.
Morten Aass is a Norwegian citizen and was CEO of Nice Entertainment Group when it was acquired by MTG in September 2013. He has served as Vice Chairman of Nice Entertainment Group and CEO of Branded/Event since March 2014 when Nice Entertainment Group was established as the parent brand for all of MTG’s content creation, production and distribution businesses. Morten was previously CEO of ProsiebenSat1’s Free-TV channels in Norway, and as Executive Chairman of Norwegian communications agency Dinamo. Morten Aass will be part of MTG’s executive management team.
Nice Entertainment Group today comprises 16 well known and powerful brands – Strix Television, DRG, Titan, Baluba, Nice Drama, Paprika Latino, Novemberfilm, Redaktörerna, Monster, One Big Happy Family, Playroom, Rakett, Moskito, Production House, Grillifilms and Gong. These brands operate through 28 local companies in 16 countries, making content available to broadcasters in 240 territories around the world. In addition, MTG’s Modern African Productions business creates and distributes content for broadcasters in Tanzania and Ghana.
Jørgen Madsen Lindemann, MTG President and CEO, commented: “The origination and delivery of high quality entertainment content is the very essence of our business, and the strong development of the Nice Entertainment Group of content businesses is a key driver of our future growth. Nice operates with the ambition to serve all broadcasters and content aggregators in its markets with high quality products, and we have substantially scaled up our operations in this area over the past two years. Morten came on board at the end of last year after we bought Nice and has proven himself him an invaluable member of the management team. His appointment to this senior role will ensure that we build on this strong platform as one of the leading producers and distributors of world class entertainment.”
“I would also like to thank Patrick for his role in building up MTG’s group of content companies over the past two and a half years. Patrick started his career at MTG over 20 years ago and came back with a clear mandate to establish a much larger content footprint and capability. Taking our content division from six companies in five countries to 28 companies in 16 countries is quite an accomplishment, and we wish him all the best for the future.”