Leon Hawthorne
Encyclopedia
Leon Hawthorne is a British television executive, journalist and presenter. He was a World News
anchor for CNN
(1996–1999) and a political correspondent for the BBC
in Westminster
(1999) before founding The Baby Channel
, the world’s first parenting television network, of which he was CEO until July 2008. From 2007, Hawthorne has focussed on creating niche TV channels for the Internet, including Beauty Zone TV, Book Zone TV and Theatreland TV.
, England
on 11 January 1966; and went to school in Cardiff
and Oxford
before going to the University of Liverpool
at the age of seventeen (1983–1986) and graduating with a BA Combined Honours degree in Politics and Sociology. Whilst at university, he was Deputy Editor of the student newspaper, the Guild & City Gazette and active in student politics.
for Carlton Television
and London Weekend Television
in January 1993. There he was a regular face reporting on London news, covering a wide range of topics including IRA terrorism, crime, business and showbiz. In 1993, Hawthorne hired a Michael Jackson
lookalike for a report on the singer’s alleged stay at London’s Priory Clinic. Hawthorne’s arrival with the fake Jackson in a limousine outside the clinic caused a stir, with hundreds of fans and TV crews mobbing the scene. In the frenzy, one radio station, LBC, reported extensively live on the “arrival” of Michael Jackson, only later to have to apologise for the mistake. In 1996, Hawthorne joined CNN as a World News Anchor, initially working from its London bureau before moving to the network’s headquarters in Atlanta. His shows ran at 7.00pm, 8.00pm and 10.00pm and included coverage of the death of Princess Diana; the murder of Gianni Versace
; the commando raid on the Japanese Embassy
in Lima, Peru and the resulting rescue of hostages held by the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement
(MRTA); and a live interview with Italian Premier Romano Prodi
. In 1998, US Vice President Al Gore
, on a walkabout around the CNN newsroom mistook Hawthorne for one of his Secret Service agents, a fact which caused some hilarity among the assembled journalists and possible consternation for the Secret Service. Hawthorne returned to London to join the BBC as a Political Correspondent. He was a member of the “Lobby”, the select group of journalists attending daily briefings at 10 Downing Street
given by then Prime Minister Tony Blair
’s Press Secretary, Alistair Campbell. Hawthorne reported for BBC1's On The Record; Radio 4’s The Westminster Hour and Today Programme; and he presented Despatch Box on BBC2. Whilst working for the BBC, Hawthorne became disillusioned by the bureaucracy and profligacy of the state broadcaster and remarked to a friend “this is no way to run a TV company”. She challenged him to do something better and that planted the seed for creating his own TV channel.
’s British Sky Broadcasting
announced plans to give away free digital satellite boxes to anyone who wanted one, and Hawthorne recognised digital compression technology allowed for hundreds of new channels to launch on the back of Sky’s distribution. Hawthorne looked at the array of niche magazines on the newsstand and zeroed in on parenting as a genre which nobody was doing on TV. The idea for the Baby Channel was born. However, the dotcom bubble burst in 2000-01 and other new niche TV channels like Channel Health and Money Channel went bust very quickly making it difficult to raise the venture capital to finance the Baby Channel. Hawthorne personally financed its launch online in 2002, on HomeChoice (now Tiscali) in June 2004 and on Virgin Media’s cable TV platform in September 2005. RDF Media Plc and Simply Media TV Ltd invested in the channel to launch it on the UK (Sky) satellite TV platform on 10 October 2005 with Hawthorne as Chief Executive Officer and a 25% shareholder. The channel’s programmes included tips on pregnancy, birth, child health, parenthood, cookery, exercise and family life.
In 2006, Hawthorne became CEO of Simply Media’s channels and production business, where he launched Simply TV as a satellite entertainment channel. Simply also launched a raft of niche web TV channels including Beauty Zone, Health Zone, Food Zone, Astrozone (for astrology), Avenue 11 (a music and showbiz channel) and Simply Entertainment (movie news). Hawthorne also created Borders TV, a web TV service for the UK book retailer; Boots TV for the pharmacy retailer; and all of the video channels on iVillage UK.
Hawthorne sold his stake in both Simply Media and the Baby Channel and resigned in July 2008. Now working through his own small vehicle, Videobite, Hawthorne has launched Waterstone’s TV for the book retailer and created two channels of his own, Book Zone TV and a theatre channel, Theatreland TV.
CNN World News
CNN World News, a program that airs on CNN International News and CNN International News Asia Pacific. It is supplemented by CNN World News Asia and CNN World News Europe The show's traditional time run is 24-hours if it is followed by CNN World News Middle East The show's regular presenters...
anchor for CNN
CNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
(1996–1999) and a political correspondent for the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
in Westminster
Westminster
Westminster is an area of central London, within the City of Westminster, England. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, southwest of the City of London and southwest of Charing Cross...
(1999) before founding The Baby Channel
The Baby Channel
The Baby Channel was a television channel aimed towards pregnant women and parents of pre-school children. Broadcast in the United Kingdom, it launched on October 10, 2005 on the Sky Digital platform. It closed down at 6am on 24 November 2008. The channel was then rebranded Simply Movies and moved...
, the world’s first parenting television network, of which he was CEO until July 2008. From 2007, Hawthorne has focussed on creating niche TV channels for the Internet, including Beauty Zone TV, Book Zone TV and Theatreland TV.
Early life
Hawthorne was born in BristolBristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
on 11 January 1966; and went to school in Cardiff
Cardiff
Cardiff is the capital, largest city and most populous county of Wales and the 10th largest city in the United Kingdom. The city is Wales' chief commercial centre, the base for most national cultural and sporting institutions, the Welsh national media, and the seat of the National Assembly for...
and Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
before going to the University of Liverpool
University of Liverpool
The University of Liverpool is a teaching and research university in the city of Liverpool, England. It is a member of the Russell Group of large research-intensive universities and the N8 Group for research collaboration. Founded in 1881 , it is also one of the six original "red brick" civic...
at the age of seventeen (1983–1986) and graduating with a BA Combined Honours degree in Politics and Sociology. Whilst at university, he was Deputy Editor of the student newspaper, the Guild & City Gazette and active in student politics.
Career
Hawthorne's television career started in August 1989 when he joined Thames Television as a researcher on a business and economics show, The City Programme. A year later, he joined the BBC as an Assistant Producer on Business Breakfast and Breakfast News, where he began appearing on camera as a reporter. He moved to Bristol, joining the ITV franchisee HTV West in order to work full-time as a reporter and get more on-screen experience. Here he produced short films on local current affairs and presented HTV News. He created a weekly business programme, Money Week, which he presented. Hawthorne returned to London at the launch of London TonightLondon Tonight
London Tonight is a regional news programme broadcast on ITV London . Produced by ITN, the programme is broadcast at 6pm every weeknight, also including local sports news and local features of interest.Like all regional news programmes on ITV in England and Wales and Channel Television, it uses...
for Carlton Television
Carlton Television
Carlton Television was the ITV franchise holder for London and the surrounding counties including the cities of Solihull and Coventry of the West Midlands, south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire,...
and London Weekend Television
London Weekend Television
London Weekend Television was the name of the ITV network franchise holder for Greater London and the Home Counties including south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire, Warwickshire, east Dorset and...
in January 1993. There he was a regular face reporting on London news, covering a wide range of topics including IRA terrorism, crime, business and showbiz. In 1993, Hawthorne hired a Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ, Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records...
lookalike for a report on the singer’s alleged stay at London’s Priory Clinic. Hawthorne’s arrival with the fake Jackson in a limousine outside the clinic caused a stir, with hundreds of fans and TV crews mobbing the scene. In the frenzy, one radio station, LBC, reported extensively live on the “arrival” of Michael Jackson, only later to have to apologise for the mistake. In 1996, Hawthorne joined CNN as a World News Anchor, initially working from its London bureau before moving to the network’s headquarters in Atlanta. His shows ran at 7.00pm, 8.00pm and 10.00pm and included coverage of the death of Princess Diana; the murder of Gianni Versace
Gianni Versace
Gianni Versace was an Italian fashion designer and founder of Gianni Versace S.p.A., an international fashion house, which produces accessories, fragrances, makeup and home furnishings as well as clothes. He also designed costumes for the theatre and films, and was a friend of Madonna, Elton John,...
; the commando raid on the Japanese Embassy
Japanese embassy hostage crisis
The Japanese embassy hostage crisis began on 17 December 1996 in Lima, Peru, when 14 members of the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement took hostage hundreds of high-level diplomats, government and military officials and business executives who were attending a party at the official residence of...
in Lima, Peru and the resulting rescue of hostages held by the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement
Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement
The Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement was a Marxist revolutionary group active in Peru from the early 1980s to 1997 and one of the main actors in the internal conflict in Peru...
(MRTA); and a live interview with Italian Premier Romano Prodi
Romano Prodi
Romano Prodi is an Italian politician and statesman. He served as the Prime Minister of Italy, from 17 May 1996 to 21 October 1998 and from 17 May 2006 to 8 May 2008...
. In 1998, US Vice President Al Gore
Al Gore
Albert Arnold "Al" Gore, Jr. served as the 45th Vice President of the United States , under President Bill Clinton. He was the Democratic Party's nominee for President in the 2000 U.S. presidential election....
, on a walkabout around the CNN newsroom mistook Hawthorne for one of his Secret Service agents, a fact which caused some hilarity among the assembled journalists and possible consternation for the Secret Service. Hawthorne returned to London to join the BBC as a Political Correspondent. He was a member of the “Lobby”, the select group of journalists attending daily briefings at 10 Downing Street
10 Downing Street
10 Downing Street, colloquially known in the United Kingdom as "Number 10", is the headquarters of Her Majesty's Government and the official residence and office of the First Lord of the Treasury, who is now always the Prime Minister....
given by then Prime Minister Tony Blair
Tony Blair
Anthony Charles Lynton Blair is a former British Labour Party politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2 May 1997 to 27 June 2007. He was the Member of Parliament for Sedgefield from 1983 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007...
’s Press Secretary, Alistair Campbell. Hawthorne reported for BBC1's On The Record; Radio 4’s The Westminster Hour and Today Programme; and he presented Despatch Box on BBC2. Whilst working for the BBC, Hawthorne became disillusioned by the bureaucracy and profligacy of the state broadcaster and remarked to a friend “this is no way to run a TV company”. She challenged him to do something better and that planted the seed for creating his own TV channel.
The Baby Channel
Hawthorne left the BBC to front World News for CNBC Europe in London, which gave him the time to develop a business plan for a new satellite television channel. In 2000, Rupert MurdochRupert Murdoch
Keith Rupert Murdoch, AC, KSG is an Australian-American business magnate. He is the founder and Chairman and CEO of , the world's second-largest media conglomerate....
’s British Sky Broadcasting
British Sky Broadcasting
British Sky Broadcasting Group plc is a satellite broadcasting, broadband and telephony services company headquartered in London, United Kingdom, with operations in the United Kingdom and the Ireland....
announced plans to give away free digital satellite boxes to anyone who wanted one, and Hawthorne recognised digital compression technology allowed for hundreds of new channels to launch on the back of Sky’s distribution. Hawthorne looked at the array of niche magazines on the newsstand and zeroed in on parenting as a genre which nobody was doing on TV. The idea for the Baby Channel was born. However, the dotcom bubble burst in 2000-01 and other new niche TV channels like Channel Health and Money Channel went bust very quickly making it difficult to raise the venture capital to finance the Baby Channel. Hawthorne personally financed its launch online in 2002, on HomeChoice (now Tiscali) in June 2004 and on Virgin Media’s cable TV platform in September 2005. RDF Media Plc and Simply Media TV Ltd invested in the channel to launch it on the UK (Sky) satellite TV platform on 10 October 2005 with Hawthorne as Chief Executive Officer and a 25% shareholder. The channel’s programmes included tips on pregnancy, birth, child health, parenthood, cookery, exercise and family life.
In 2006, Hawthorne became CEO of Simply Media’s channels and production business, where he launched Simply TV as a satellite entertainment channel. Simply also launched a raft of niche web TV channels including Beauty Zone, Health Zone, Food Zone, Astrozone (for astrology), Avenue 11 (a music and showbiz channel) and Simply Entertainment (movie news). Hawthorne also created Borders TV, a web TV service for the UK book retailer; Boots TV for the pharmacy retailer; and all of the video channels on iVillage UK.
Hawthorne sold his stake in both Simply Media and the Baby Channel and resigned in July 2008. Now working through his own small vehicle, Videobite, Hawthorne has launched Waterstone’s TV for the book retailer and created two channels of his own, Book Zone TV and a theatre channel, Theatreland TV.