With the advent of the digital era, almost all big names are trying to tap into the ecosystem and Fox is ready to tap into the immersive sectors with the inception of FoxNext. The freshly formed division will be working on the gaming, virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR) properties and location-based entertainment across 20th Century Fox Film and Fox Networks Group.
To spearhead the newly formed division, the company has placed veteran Fox executive, Salil Mehta, as the president of FoxNext, with immediate effect.
Mehta recently served as president of content management for 20th Century Fox Film and now would be reporting to Fox Networks Group, chairman and CEO, Peter Rice and 20th Century Fox Film, chairman and CEO, Stacey Snider.
According to an announcement, FoxNext has emerged from Fox Innovation Lab, which was its first VR endeavour with 2016’s The Martian VR Experience. The division will now look after some of the already undertaken initiatives like Alien and Planet of the Apes productions. It will also bring under its wings the video-gaming groups responsible for The Simpsons: Tapped Out mobile game and the Alien: Isolation console / PC game.
“Extending our storytelling to new platforms in new ways is a constant focus for us as we look to build more touch points with consumers every day,” said Snider. “Building on the momentum we’ve already seen in this area via the Fox Innovation Lab, FoxNext represents a natural next step in defining our long-term vision in this arena, and Salil is quite simply the perfect executive to build this group into what we know will be an industry leader.”
Prior to this, Mehta held several senior executive roles at NBCUniversal, most recently being COO of the company unit that included Bravo, Oxygen and Style, the Spanish-language broadcast network Telemundo; and NBCUniversal’s digital assets that include Fandango and Daily Candy. Prior to NBCUniversal, he worked for 14 years in a number of roles at The Walt Disney Company.