An executive shuffle is sending several top Amazon Video employees over to Apple.
Tara Sorensen, who served as the head of kids programming during her stint at Amazon, will begin a similar role at Apple in January. Two of her colleagues Amazon colleagues, international development exec Carina Walker and head of business affairs Tara Pietri, will move to Apple as well. News of these transactions was first shared by The Hollywood Reporter.
At Amazon, Sorensen helped bring a plethora of TV-quality, family-friendly programs to Prime subscribers. One of the platform’s most notable children’s show was a reboot of Sid and Marty Krofft’s classic series Sigmund and the Sea Monsters.
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At Apple, Sorensen will work with her colleagues to build an original program lineup that can compete with the likes of Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu. The Cupertino-based tech giant has already committed $1 billion over a one-year period in order to populate the premium content library available on its $9.99-per-month Apple Music service.
Sorensen, Walker, and Pietri are not the first executives to move from Amazon to Apple in recent months. In October, programming bigwig Morgan Wandell jumped ship after spending four years at Amazon. Around the same time, the retailer suspended the head of Amazon Video, Roy Price, due to allegations of sexual misconduct.
The latest exodus continues a series of negative headlines for Amazon Prime. Due to reported pressure from Jeff Bezos himself, the SVOD service recently canceled several of its shows and passed on all three of the projects it featured in its latest pilot season.
Apple, on the other hand, is looking good, but there’s still work to do. The tech giant’s new employees will need to deliver strong shows once they begin their new roles in January.
