Former Time Warner Cable CEO Joseph J. Collins – Business News
Joseph J. Collins, a central determine in tv’s evolution from broadcast dominance to cable and web, died final Thursday at his home in Weekapaug, RI, in line with a household spokesman. He was 81.
The veteran cable chief — whose management roles spanned HBO, Time Warner Cable, Comcast and more — emerged as one of probably the most consequential figures within the media biz, serving to reposition cable as more than simply a supply system for TV.
Long earlier than broadband web took off, Collins was among the many industry leaders who noticed that the identical networks carrying premium programming may someday ship high-speed knowledge and change how Americans lived, labored and consumed content material.
Joseph J. Collins, a former Time Warner Cable CEO, died final week at his home in Rhode Island. Getty Images
He held prime roles at a number of of the industry’s largest firms during durations of important transition.
In 1984, he was named president of HBO, the place he helped regular and strengthen the premium community because it established itself as a dominant model.
Collins later returned to American Television and Communications (ATC), the place he had risen by the ranks, finally serving as chairman and CEO.
Following ATC’s merger with Time Warner Cable in 1992, Collins led the mixed firms as chairman and CEO, overseeing a period of enlargement and technological evolution that helped lay the groundwork for broadband’s eventual explosive growth.
He later headed up AOL Time Warner Interactive Video, the place he pushed early efforts to merge TV and internet-based companies. After his retirement, he was elected as an unbiased director on the Comcast board in 2004.
“Joe was instrumental in building the first cable systems, upgrading them to deliver hundreds of channels, then video on demand, and finally the broadband streaming and internet apps that we all use every day now,” former Time Warner chairman and CEO Jeff Bewkes stated in a assertion.
Pictured on Nov. 14, 1997 on the Cable Ace Awards Collins (proper), then-chairman & CEO of Time Warner Cable, is introduced with the Distinguished Vanguard Award by his buddy Ted Turner (left) then the vice chairman of Time Warner. Courtesy of the Collins household
Born July 27, 1944, in Troy, NY, Collins got here of age simply as TV, telecommunications and computing had been starting to intersect.
He graduated from Brown University in 1966 and earned an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1972.
He additionally served within the US Navy, reaching the rank of lieutenant and incomes the Vietnam Combat Action Ribbon for his service during the Vietnam War.
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Collins was extensively credited with advancing hybrid fiber-coaxial structure, the technical spine that will allow high-speed cable web throughout the States.
Media titan John Malone, who earned the nickname “Cable Cowboy,” as soon as instructed his group, “if I have a heart attack, call Joe Collins.”
Collins additionally performed a function in shaping coverage, serving twice as chairman of the National Cable Telecommunications Association and contributing to the development of the landmark Telecommunications Act of 1996.
Collins performed a pivotal function within the evolution of tv’s transition from broadcast to cable and finally the web. Getty Images
The longtime exec was additionally a founder and a chairman of C-SPAN and a board member at TriStar Pictures and TBS, the place he performed a pivotal function in Turner’s 1996 merger with Time Warner.
He obtained the cable industry’s Distinguished Vanguard Award for Leadership in 1997 and was inducted into the Cable Hall of Fame in 2001.
In later years, Collins acquired and operated a number of boatyards and served as chairman of Aegis Holdings, a non-public investment firm.
He was additionally an avid tennis participant and an achieved mariner, typically spending time aboard his boat alongside the Rhode Island coast.
He is survived by his spouse of 54 years, Maura McManman Collins; his youngsters, Maura Farley Lucke, Elizabeth Dempsey Fitton, Joseph Jameson Collins Jr. and Kathryn “Tryn” Collins; and 11 grandchildren.
A funeral is scheduled for April 13 in Rhode Island.
