Shannon O’Neill has been named president of the Travel Channel, the network announced Wednesday. O’Neill has spent the last three years as Travel Channel’s senior VP and CFO. The promotion is effective immediately, and he will report to Scripps Networks operating division president Burton Jablin.
He succeeds Laureen Ong, who stepped down in October 2013, one month after Jablin was promoted. Ong had been president of Travel Channel since 2010, and oversaw a period of transition following Scripps' purchase of a majority interest in the network from Cox Communications in 2009.
“Shannon is an outstanding leader and strategic thinker with extensive experience creating new media businesses, building audiences and growing revenues,” Jablin said. “His mission as president of Travel Channel will be to deliver programming that embraces and celebrates travel as a video content category, while increasing the network’s audience profile of upscale, educated and highly valued viewers.”
Previous stints for O’Neill include the Golf Channel and Comcast’s programming group.
