Manager, Global Rights & Licensing

Job Description

THE DIVISON'S STORY
Much like medieval knights, our Legal and Business Affairs team protects the livelihood of the kingdom. We're the forgers of iron-clad contracts, overseers of content production and defenders of intellectual property rights. Given the competitive nature of our industry, collaboration and attention to detail are traits we highly prize, and you should value and match those attributes. Also, you should have a POV and enjoy staying tuned in to new commercial developments.

The Manager, Global Rights & Licensing position requires an advanced understanding of complex media rights, negotiation skills, and proficiency with web-based applications and rights management software. The position services multiple business groups, researching and confirming rights at all states of a program's life cycle. The Manager, Global Rights & Licensing is diplomatic, has excellent communication skills and is an innovative problem solver.

In this role, you will oversee A+E's clip licensing business, researching specific footage rights and coordinating with Legal, PR and Programming to assess Risk and brand management prior to licensing. You will also manage the Font Licensing business, which requires frequent interfacing with the On-Air and Graphics team to ensure they have cleared resources for their creative campaigns. Lastly, you will work with the Director, Global Rights on a variety of program availability initiatives, including Educational Sales, Program Renewals, and availability reports which will require you to independently analyze legal agreements for licensed third-party materials and interpret the contracts under the current Rights landscape.

MORE ABOUT WHAT YOU'LL DO:
• Manage A+E's growing individual rights licensing business, handling assessment and licensing of A+E, History, Lifetime and BIO media assets from Rights analysis to billing and order fulfilment; this includes oversight of A+E's permissions and licensing portal, A+E Select.
• Oversee the font licensing business which requires: review and analysis of end user license agreements for new fonts, advising on potential risk and costs, negotiating terms and license fees when fonts are found acceptable for use, and supervising payment, delivery, and rights tracking. Additional Font Management duties include liaising with IT to upload cleared fonts and corresponding Rights into the Universal Type Client (UTC) Server and coordinating the deployment of fonts to all licensed users via Extensis.
• Manage the protection of font software for company-wide use by collaborating with IP attorney on font usage policy and font user education, and conducts periodic workshops as needed.
• Track patterns and trends in the licensing landscape in order to establish and update internal rate cards and best practices.
• Facilitate requests from Educational Sales for on demand and detailed rights analysis for target programs and markets, and provide them with continually updated content availability reports for revenue generating opportunities, as well as handling licensing of individual users' requests for content.
• Assess program rights through analysis of agreements, third party licenses, and disseminates distribution and exhibition rights to Programming, A+E Studios, Marketing, Publicity, Digital, and Legal for various initiatives.
• Perform legal research, rights availability queries, program renewal cost analysis requests, and negotiating music and media clearance requests, as needed.
• Research copyright status and license a variety of media including film, music, books, magazines, etc. for ad-hoc production needs.
• Must possess both a broad and deep understanding of the music and media licensing landscape in order to support the Program Renewal Business. This will require the ability to negotiate favorable rates/terms to acquire rights for the usage of master recordings, music publishing, feature film and television clips, talent, logos, artwork and more as embodied in pre-existing productions.

YOUR STORY: (what you need to have)
• Bachelor's Degree.
• 7+ years' experience in Rights & Clearances, Rights Management or Contract Administration/Licensing position for a media company.
• Must be able to work in a team environment, exhibit professionalism and foster positive working relationships with internal and external clients.
• Detail oriented and the ability to handle a large volume of work and to perform daily duties autonomously and efficiently.
• Knowledge of complex media rights; ability to interpret/analyze license or agreement language
• Drafting and negotiation skills;
• Understanding of Copyright Law and copyright research tools; ability to assess risk, minimizing potential claims.
• Experience with rights management software and databases.
• Clear written and verbal communication skills.
• Excellent skills in Word, Excel, PowerPoint.
• The candidate will have a four-year college degree.

Jobcode: Reference SBJ-gwp36j-3-146-105-137-42 in your application.