Beyond Rights recruits Jones as SVP Development
October 17, 2022
Beyond Rights has announced that seasoned television executive Steve Jones has joined its London-based team to fill the newly created role, as SVP of development.
Jones has worked in the UK and Australia in a range of high-profile positions, including commissioning editor and executive producer, entertainment and factual, at Sky 1; executive producer, factual and factual entertainment at Discovery Networks Europe; development executive and series producer at CJZ Productions; and executive producer and development executive at Endemol Southern Star. He also co-founded Big Little Fish Television in 2019, the UK indie he co-ran for more than two years. Across permanent and freelance roles over the past two decades he has created programming for many UK, US and Australian broadcasters. Titles he has commissioned, developed and executive produced include formats Extreme Makeover UK, Don’t Forget the Lyrics! and Sky One’s Gladiators reboot, international sales hit MegaTruckers, Say Yes to the Dress, Killing Michael Jackson, Faking It: Tears of a Crime and The Curse of the Highgate Vampire for Discovery and The Lancaster at 80 and Married to a Psychopath for Channel 4.
Reporting into Beyond Rights’ CEO, David Smyth, Jones has a brief to develop original ideas for returnable, popular factual series that meet demand in the market and that will also sit comfortably alongside similar successful programming in the Beyond Rights catalogue. Working with established production partners, these ideas will be pitched to broadcasters for pre-sale, co-production and commission. After securing a key broadcaster, Beyond Rights will manage any additional financing required for production and distribute all finished series and formats globally.
David Smyth comments: “Our world is changing rapidly and obtaining the rights and the right content for our business is increasingly challenging. So, we have decided to develop a new content pipeline to sit alongside our terrific acquisitions from third-party producers, as well as the content we have from the wider Beyond group. Steve is a hugely experienced executive, bursting with ideas, and is an exciting addition to our team. He will bring new creativity and thinking to the business and in return, he will be able to draw on the experiences, relationships and international market knowledge of our sales and acquisitions teams, who are well placed to know what buyers want.”
Steve Jones adds: “Beyond Rights is taking a very interesting strategic step with this new role. I am delighted to be working with David and the wider teams – and look forward to securing our first greenlight.”