Jeff Shultz, who has served as chief strategy officer and chief business development officer of Paramount Global’s streaming division, is leaving the company at the end of the year.
Shultz joined Paramount in 2019 as part of the acquisition of Pluto TV and was a key executive on the leadership team that launched and grew the Paramount+ subscription service. He has overseen strategy, distribution and business development for both Paramount+ and Pluto TV.
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Shultz announced that he will leave Paramount Global in a Friday on LinkedIn. “To my colleagues at Paramount Streaming, writing this incredible story with you has been the honor of my career,” he wrote. “I’m sorry I won’t be with you for the next chapter, but I can’t wait to see where you go from here.”
Paramount is expanding the role of Ray Hopkins, president of U.S. networks distribution, to now include streaming and linear partners/distribution, the company’s three co-CEOs — George Cheeks, Chris McCarthy and Brian Robbins — announced in an internal memo Friday. As a result of this shift, Shultz “will be departing the organization and the Streaming [distribution and business development] team will now transition under Ray,” the execs said in the memo.
In July, Paramount Global and controlling shareholder Shari Redstone clinched a deal to merge Paramount with Skydance Media, a transaction expected to close in the first half of 2025. In the meantime, Paramount has engaged in layoffs and restructuring in its U.S. workforce aimed at slashing 15% of its domestic headcount.
Separately Friday, Paramount disclosed that .
Shultz joined , after serving as an adviser to the free, ad-supported streaming startup for three years. A year later, for $340 million. Tom Ryan, former CEO of Pluto TV, is now CEO of Paramount Streaming.
Ryan, in a comment on Shultz’s LinkedIn post, said: “Jeff, thank you for everything you have done for Paramount Streaming. Pluto TV and Paramount+ would never have come so far so fast without your talent, drive, optimism and collaboration. We will be forever grateful for your immense contributions and you will be sorely missed.”
“Six and a half years ago, celebrating the acquisition of Pluto TV by Viacom with the team in Santa Barbara, I gave a toast recognizing the moment that concluded: ‘We’re just getting started,’” Shultz wrote in the LinkedIn post. “Despite all we have accomplished since then, I still feel the same way. So with mixed emotions I share that I will be leaving Paramount later this year.”
Shultz touted deals that he cut for Pluto TV’s service, including with the NFL, Major League Baseball, Warner Bros. Discovery, A+E Networks, AMC Networks, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Lionsgate, MGM, Fremantle and Banijay Entertainment. Under his leadership, Pluto TV also inked partnership deals with Amazon, Roku, Google, Apple, T-Mobile, Verizon, Comcast, Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, Vizio and more.
In 2019, the year Viacom acquired Pluto TV, the free streamer generated about $70 million in revenue; three years later, “Pluto TV was a billion-dollar business,” according to Shultz. In 2021, the company rebranded CBS All Access as Paramount+ to create the Paramount Streaming division. In the second quarter of 2024, the division reported revenue of $1.9 billion, representing one-fourth of Paramount Global revenue.
Prior to Pluto TV, Shultz held senior leadership roles in digital business development at media companies including NBC and CBS, and internet TV startups Clicker and Concert TV, which he co-founded. In 2022, Shultz was named . He began his career as a lawyer for Linklaters in London after earning a law degree from Georgetown University.
In his LinkedIn post, Shultz said he was “deeply grateful for the leadership and friendship of Tom Ryan, and the partnership and excellence of the Paramount Streaming leadership team Elizabeth Wright, Domenic DiMeglio, Jeff Grossman, Amy Kuessner, Olivier Jollet, Marco Nobili, Erin Calhoun, and Abhinav Chopra.”
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