Herbert A. Granath
Vice Chairman, Chairman of Corporate Governance/Nominating Committee and Related Party Transactions Committee and member of Compensation Committee
Herbert A. Granath is Chairman Emeritus, ESPN, and Senior Content Advisor to Telenet, the largest cable operator in Belgium. He is Co-Chairman of Crown Media Holdings, whic owns and operates the Hallmark Channel. He is also Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Media and Entertainment Holdings, Inc., a special purpose vehicle for the acquisition of media, entertainment and commuications businesses.
Previously, he was Chairman, Discovery/ABC International, where he was responsible for the international television production and program distribution activities of the Walt Disney Company and its wholly-owned subsidiary, ABC Inc.
Granath had a long and distinguished career at ABC where he was a pioneer in many aspects of the television business. He led ABC into the cable and international arenas and helped position the company as the industry leader in these fields.
During this time he served as Chairman of the Board of ESPN, A&E, The History Channel, The Biography Channel and Lifetime Television. Internationally he was a founding partner and Board member of Eurosport, the largest cable network in Europe. He also served on the Boards of Telefunf, RTL2 and TM3 networks in Germany, Scandinavian Broadcasting Systems (SBS) and TVA, the Brazilian Pay-TV company.
An early believer in European local television production he brought ABC into partnership with, and joined the Boards of Telemunchen (Germany), Hamster (France) and Tesauro (Spain) production companies.
Included in the numerous awards he has received are two Tony awards, along with six Tony nominations, an International EMMY (Lifetime Achievement in International TV), as well as a U.S. EMMY (Lifetime Achievement in Sports Television). He has also been honored by the National Association of Broadcasters as a Broadcast Pioneer and received the European Lifetime Achievement Award at the Rose d'Or Festival in Lucerne, Switzerland.
