Supponor strengthens with appointments of Ross Hair and Steve Plunkett
New Supponor managing director Ross Hair
Sports virtual advertising technology specialist Supponor has announced two major appointments to its senior leadership team in a move designed to help scale the company to meet the increasing market demand for its services.
Ross Hair joins Supponor as managing director and will oversee and lead the company’s ongoing success. Hair brings 25 years of commercial experience to Supponor, building and leading divisions of major media organisations. Most recently, he held the role of SVP, commercial EMEA at Discovery Communications as well as past roles including managing director of ESPN EMEA, and EVP EMEA for Sony Pictures Television International.
Hair commented: “Sport, media and innovative technology are my three great passions so I’m thrilled to be joining the Supponor team to help build on their pioneering work in virtual advertising. Supponor’s real-time, streamlined solutions are creating new ways to commercialise live sport, so I look forward to working with key rights holders and new digital platforms to demonstrate the advances being made – and the opportunities being created.”
Product and technology leader Steve Plunkett joins from Ericsson’s Broadcast & Media Services business unit where he was chief technology officer. Prior to joining Ericsson, Plunkett held roles including chief technology officer at Red Bee Media and chief architect at Motorola, leveraging technology innovation to build breakthrough products and services.
As chief product officer, Steve Plunkett will be responsible for the product and technology functions within Supponor, leading a team of industry experts in Helsinki and London, and applying his many years’ experience in large-scale product innovation to the growing business.
Steve Plunkett has joined Supponor in the role of chief product officer
Vesa Suontama, chief technology officer, Supponor, commented: “We are excited to have Steve join the team as we augment the deep talent pool of our core technologists, engineers and scientists who have been responsible for delivering Supponor’s world-class technology solutions. His broadcast solutions background is perfectly aligned with the primary areas of growth for our growing product portfolio for streaming/OTT and artificial intelligence.”
Plunkett added: “Supponor combines cutting edge technology and expertise in the areas of sports tech, ad tech and augmented reality into products that serve the most valuable and demanding content in the world – live premium sports. It is an incredibly exciting space and it’s an honour to join the amazing team at Supponor and be part of its future growth.”
James B Gambrell, CEO, Supponor, said: “As the pioneer and clear market leader in Virtual Replacement Technologies for live sport, our entire efforts are devoted to this field of technology and how it transforms the meaning and economics of brand communication delivered through the medium of sports advertising. These senior appointments are a testament to what we have already achieved and support our existing team as we continue to develop ever more capable and efficient technologies as we scale our business to meet the rapidly growing demands of rights holders, broadcasters and sponsors.”