Former WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar is jumping into the realm of video games. On Thursday, it was announced that Kilar has joined the board of directors at Roblox, the incredibly-popular online gaming platform. Kilar was reportedly appointed to the board on September 13th, marking his most high-profile job yet since parting ways with Warner Bros. in April of 2022, just prior to its merger with Discovery. Prior to working at WarnerMedia, Kilar also co-founded and served as the CEO of Vessel Group, and was also the co-founder and first CEO of the popular streaming service Hulu.
“Jason Kilar is a well-respected leader in the entertainment and media industry, and his experience in the space is of value to the Board as Roblox continues to scale globally,” David Baszucki, chairman and CEO of Roblox, said in a statement.
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“I am honored to join Roblox, a company I have long admired and cheered from afar as they leaned into the future,” Kilar added. “Roblox is changing the way people come together and changing how creators can create delightful experiences for them. I am excited to join the board and do all I can to help bring Roblox’s vision to life.”
What Did Jason Kilar Do at WarnerMedia?
Kilar became CEO of WarnerMedia in May of 2020, and was tied to a number of buzzworthy decisions made by the media conglomerate. Kilar helped launch HBO Max (now known as Max), the company’s exclusive streaming marketplace. He also made waves throughout the entertainment industry for his “Project Popcorn” initiative, which sent all of Warner Bros.’ 2021 movies — including Dune, The Suicide Squad, and Godzilla vs. Kong — exclusively to HBO Max on the same day as their theatrical debut. While the decision was made amid the unexpected circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, Kilar later recognized that he should have tackled it differently.
“I will be the first one to say, and the responsibility rests on my shoulders, that, in hindsight, we should have taken the better part of a month to have over 170 conversations – which is the number of participants that are in our 2021 film slate,” Kilar explained in a subsequent interview. “We tried to do that in a compressed period of time, less than a week, because of course there was going to be leaks there was going to be everybody opining on whether we should do this or not do this.”
Kilar was also tied to a number of significant decisions in Warner Bros.’ DC franchise, including greenlighting the “Snyder Cut” of Justice League, which premiered exclusively on HBO Max in 2021. He also spearheaded a string of streaming-exclusive DC movies, ultimately resulting in Blue Beetle, which was given a theatrical release earlier this summer, and Batgirl, which was canceled by Kilar’s successor, David Zaslav, despite having already completed production.
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