MSNBC Will Retain Its Name After Comcast Spinoff (January 2025)
deadline.com

... MSNBC will retain its name after it is spun off from Comcast along with other cable assets.

Mark Lazarus, who is leading the new company, told network staffers of the plans at a meeting today to announce the departure of Rashida Jones as the network's president and the naming of Rebecca Kutler as interim leader, according to a network source.

"I know there was some discussion with the MSNBC name, so you can take that off of your worry list on things," Lazarus said at the meeting.

Kutler also will be hiring a head of newsgathering and head of talent, Lazarus said. Throughout its history, MSNBC has drawn on correspondents and anchors from sister network NBC News, which will remain part of Comcast.

Lazarus said, "The only thing I'll say is the worst thing any leader can do is change something that's working just because they can. So, if this is working, then there's no reason to change it."

The spinoff, announced in November, is expected to take about a year to complete. It also will include USA Network, CNBC, Oxygen, E!, SYFY and Golf Channel.

MSNBC launched in 1996 as a venture between NBC News and Microsoft. It had a heavy emphasis on the then-emerging internet, but its primetime eventually evolved into a progressive alternative to right-leaning Fox News. ...

... "I know there was some discussion with the MSNBC name, so you can take that off of your worry list on things," Lazarus said at the meeting. ...

Oops.

MSNOW may have a differing opinion ...

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Nearing split with NBC News, MSNBC starts building a news operation (March 2025)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2025/03/06/msnbc-news-scott-matthews-hiring/

... Throughout much of its 28-year history, MSNBC has leaned on NBC News to help provide the hard-news reporting that appears on it, supplementing the work of its own anchors and opinion hosts.

But that will all change when, most likely this year, MSNBC is spun off from the network as part of a new corporate entity that is being called SpinCo, along with several other cable channels owned by Comcast.

Ahead of that split, MSNBC is in the process of building out an independent newsgathering and reporting operation that will include a bureau in Washington and a newsroom in New York, away from its longtime base at 30 Rockefeller Plaza.

That news operation will be led by veteran executive Scott Matthews, who will serve as MSNBC's senior vice president of newsgathering, network president Rebecca Kutler announced to employees in a memo Thursday morning that was provided to The Washington Post.

Matthews joins MSNBC from New York's WABC-TV, where he has been vice president and news director since 2022. Before that, he worked as an executive producer and programming director at CNN and as a vice president of special programming at the financial news channel CNBC. ...