Acquisitions

The boards of directors of the Alliance for Audited Media and

BPA Worldwide have unanimously approved a plan for the two companies to merge. The two not-for-profit media auditing organizations are joining forces to increase trust and assurance across media channels through innovative service development. Pending member and regulatory approval, the merger is expected to be completed in spring 2023. AAM’S CEO and managing director, Tom Drouillard, will be CEO. BPA’S CEO, Rich Murphy, will be president.

The Arena Group Holdings, Inc. has acquired Fexy Studios, an awardwinning creative agency that produces television shows, streaming and digital video programming, and branded content across a variety of mediums including desktop and mobile web, OTT, broadcast television, Youtube, Twitch, Instagram, Facebook, webinars and more. The Arena Group will leverage the strength of its core brands and continued audience growth coupled with Fexy’s production and branded video capabilities to expand its streaming, sponsored content and television programming, while enhancing sales and revenue generation across The Arena Group properties. Cliff Sharples, Fexy Studios co-founder, has joined The Arena Group as head of Fexy Studios to scale and build out TV, streaming and cross-platform advertising opportunities, as well as a larger portfolio of shows for The Arena Group’s verticals.

The Arena Group Holdings, Inc.,a tech-powered media company home to more than 240 brands, including Sports Illustrated, Thestreet, Inc. and Parade Media, has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the digital assets of Men’s Journal, Men’s Fitness, Surfer, Powder, Bike, Skateboarding, Snowboarder and Newschoolers from accelerate360. The collection of active lifestyle brands, which will provide the core components of The Arena Group’s fourth major vertical, has been a staple of those enjoying active and adventurous lives.

Dow Jones has made an equity investment in Ripjar, a global leader in data intelligence software. The two companies have worked together since 2018 to deliver a platform that enables continuous, real-time screening and monitoring to help financial institutions and large corporations protect their businesses from financial crime risk.

Cars Holding, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Block Communications, Inc. has acquired Pittsburgh City Paper from Eagle Media, the publisher of the Butler Eagle, which has operated the weekly tabloid paper and digital site since 2016. Block Communications, an Ohiobased corporation, is also the owner of the Pittsburgh Post-gazette and The Blade of Toledo.

Eli Saslow, who has won the Pulitzer

Prize for explanatory reporting and been a finalist for feature writing three times, has joined The New York Times from The Washington Post. At The Times, he will continue to write his signature narrative stories chronicling people across the country whose lives intersect with national themes.

Katie Rosman, who has written a seemingly endless series of enthralling stories as a reporter on Styles, is joining Metro at The New York Times. She has been with The Times since 2014 after 10 years as a staff writer at The Wall Street Journal.

Mara Hvistendahl has joined The New York Times as a new investigative correspondent focused on Asia. She comes from The Intercept, where she has been an investigative reporter for the past three years.

Ernesto Londoño will join the National staff at The New York

Times on Feb. 27 as a correspondent based in Minnesota. As part of the Midwest team, which covers 11 states in the middle of the country, he will work closely with the paper’s Chicago-based bureau chief, Julie Bosman, and Mitch Smith, a Midwestbased correspondent, to deepen coverage of this region. He has been with The Times since 2014 as an editorial writer.

Cliff Levy will take on a major new role at The New York Times Company, becoming deputy publisher of Wirecutter and The Athletic. He will work closely with David Perpich, publisher of Wirecutter and The Athletic, and other company leaders to advance the growth of these important pillars of The Times’ journalism and the subscriber bundle. The transition into the new position is set to occur in the first half of 2023, after Levy’s current duties culminate. He is a twotime Pulitzer Prize winner, with 32 years at The Times.

Deanna Donegan is Well’s new art director at the New York Times Company. In her four years at The Times, she has implemented a high standard for art direction, design and identity on a range of products, newsletters and columns for various desks, most recently in her role as Well’s interim design lead.

David French is a new columnist with The New York Times. An expert on the law, faith and politics, he joins the staff from The Dispatch, which he helped launch, and The Atlantic, where he was a contributing writer.

Newsroom Operations at The New York Times recently welcomed a new operations manager. Carlisa Robinson is working closely to streamline operations for the International

Desk, working alongside the Senior Operations Manager, Rorna Richards. She has 15 years of experience as an administrative professional in finance and operations management in the higher education sector. She joins

The New York Times from New York University’s Steinhardt School where she was the administrative director of the Department of Media, Culture and Communication.

Alex Kingsbury is taking over international coverage for the Opinion department at The New York Times — in the newly created position of senior editor, international. He came to Opinion in 2018 from The Boston Globe, where he was the deputy ideas editor. In addition, Kristen Cruzata is being promoted to chief of staff to the Opinion editor. In this newly created position, she will continue to craft Opinion’s communications strategy and be an important conduit in the department itself but also across The Times.

Sapna Maheshwari has joined

The New York Times’ media group covering Tiktok, emerging media and whatever other surprises come along. In a way, this is a homecoming for her. She covered advertising when she joined The Times in 2016 and later covered retail. She previously was a reporter at Buzzfeed News and Bloomberg News.

Maria Cramer, who has been with The New York Times since 2019, moved to Metro in January as police bureau chief.

The New York Times has announced new roles for three members of the video team. Sameen Amin was promoted to deputy of the video department. Whitney Hurst was promoted to executive producer of visual investigations. Malachy Browne is taking on the role of enterprise investigations director for visual investigations.

The New York Times has introduced a programming team behind the New York Times Audio app, a new app for journalism and storytelling. The team will be led by Shreeya Sinha. In a decade at The Times, she has been an editor on several desks: International, Investigations, Obituaries and National, where she led audience efforts and led coverage around opioid addiction. Additional appointments include: Mukul Devichand, as editor of programming for NYT Audio; Tyler Cabot, deputy programming editor;

Laura Kim, deputy editor focused on operations; Zoe Murphy, assistant programming editor based in London;

Dan Levin, an assistant programming editor based in New York; Pierreantoine Louis, a staff editor working on programming; Jake Lucas, a staff

editor on the New York programming team; art director of NYT Audi; senior photo editor; and a photo editor on the app.

The New York Times has welcomed several new colleagues in Audio.

joins the team as a senior editor of “The Daily.”

and join the staff as producers on “The Daily.”

joins the team as a producer for a new show on the paper’s audio app. joins the engineering team as an associate sound designer and composer and joins as a supervising editor on the shows team.

has joined The New York Times as an assistant content strategist for New York Times Cooking. In this new role, Jiang will help oversee the strategic placement of Cooking recipes and stories across various platforms. She joins the staff from Buzzfeed where she was an SEO writer on the commerce team.