BBC News digital director Naja Nielsen is leaving the corporation after almost six years to join Swedish public broadcaster SVT as media director.
The BBC said she will leave “in the coming months” and her replacement will be announced in due course.
Since joining the BBC in 2019, Nielsen has launched new products and strategies including livestreams, BBC News on Tiktok and other vertical video, a new BBC News app, newsletters and local news push alerts.
Before joining the BBC Nielsen was chief journalism officer at Washington DC-based investigative start-up Orb Media and previously head of news and deputy director at Danish public broadcaster DR.
At SVT Nielsen will be responsible for the broadcaster’s digital services and publishing strategies – “how, when and where content is published” – including overall responsibility for its use of AI.
Nielsen said the new role will bring her closer to her family in Denmark, where she was born and began her career.
She said: “I can’t express how grateful I am for the trust BBC has put in me, for everything I have learned, and for the generosity and kindness everyone at the BBC has shown me. It has been a privilege to work for a media company where the top leadership walk the talk and have the courage to modernise and protect our core mission at the same time, and it has been fantastic to lead such a wonderful team.
“The BBC is a uniquely purpose-driven, courageous, creative and forward-looking organisation that I will continue to consume, support, admire and be inspired by as I lead the next steps forward at SVT, a role I am honoured to be entrusted with.”
BBC News chief executive Deborah Turness said: “In Naja’s five years with us, her impact on BBC News is hard to overstate. She has led the transformation of our digital offer, passionately pioneered live pages and streaming, and put data at the heart of our decision making. Naja has led our social teams to make BBC News a force on social platforms where we are targeting young audiences – first building scale on Instagram where BBC News is the biggest global news brand, and then on Tiktok where we’ve grown followers 65% in the last year and are the second-largest UK news account.
“Naja’s rich experience and expertise were formed both by her time spent in the US, where she immersed herself in Silicon Valley and the big tech companies’ ways of working, and in the innovative Scandinavian news market. That unique combination positioned Naja to be a courageous leader who has championed our digital investments and accelerated the pace of change.”
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