Amrita Sidhu has been appointed Director of Media Intelligence of Australia’s media connections and analysis businesses, Medianet and Mediaverse, as parent company Mediality restructures.
Amrita Sidhu joins Medianet/Mediaverse parent company Mediality with a background in sales and marketing, technology and product management and more recently responsibility for global sales and partnerships for a video production SaaS platform.
Mediality offers media solutions to amplify and enhance news and information across publishing platforms. Mediality is the new brand for the media services company that emerged from the sale of Australian Associated Press.
Owned by Australian publishing groups News Corp, Nine, the West Australian and Australian Community Media, Mediality is the home for three business divisions – Pagemasters, Medianet and Mediaverse, and Mediality Racing.
Sidhu, a former national sales director for newswire AAP, has a high degree of familiarity with Medianet and a deep understanding of the Australian and New Zealand media landscape.
She brings considerable commercial experience and management responsibility from her time as GM Asia for Tigerspike, a technology agency that designs and builds enterprise level digital solutions, including front-end platforms and apps and back-end databases and infrastructure.
Her most recent role was as global head of commercial and partnerships for VMG and was responsible for the expansion of a team across Asia Pacific and the US to roll out a SaaS social media video solution for digital advertisers.
Bruce Davidson, the CEO of Mediality, said Sidhu’s combination of sales experience, executive management, and product and technology expertise is the right fit for the company.
“She will build on the very strong foundations created by the Medianet and Mediaverse leadership teams over many years,” he said.
Mediality’s restructure is due to a decision to rationalise the management structure for the two operations and take an increasingly product and technology enabled approach to ensure future business performance.
The result is that MD Medianet and Mediaverse, Michael O’Connell, and GM Medianet, Sarah Higgins, will leave the business.
Davidson paid tribute to O’Connell and Higgins for their service to AAP (the former owner of the Medianet and Mediaverse brands) and more lately Mediality.
O’Connell joined the fold in 2007 when AAP acquired his media monitoring and analysis business, Media Research Group. He was instrumental in the growth and development of monitoring and analysis over a number of years. When AAP made the decision to sell its media monitoring arm, O’Connell assumed responsibility for Medianet as well as MRG. AAP then acquired Mediaverse and O’Connell managed the transition of both customers and staff, and later helped streamline our media intelligence market presence to the two current media brands. He was also critical in the integration of Directories after its acquisition in 2014.
O’Connell’s understanding and breadth of knowledge of the media intelligence sector is second to none in Australia. His pragmatic, no-nonsense business approach has always been refreshing, building solid relationships with customers and suppliers. Similarly, he had engendered a great culture among the Mediaverse and more lately the Medianet staff.
Higgins joined AAP in 2006 in the Medianet marketing department and quickly built a reputation as a highly effective and solution-orientated professional. She has built a wealth of knowledge about the media intelligence sector after moving from the marketing role into business management for Medianet.
Higgins has helmed Medianet’s sales and marketing strategy, product innovation and enhancement, and customer experience development for nearly a decade. She also has nurtured and guided her team with care and appreciation.
Sidhu will commence on Monday 6 September.
