Samantha Friedman

Samantha Friedman is a Managing Director in the Telecom, Media and Technology (“TMT”) practice within FTI Consulting’s Corporate Finance segment, specializing in the media and entertainment sector. Ms. Friedman has about 15 years of experience in the industry as both a consultant and an operator.

Ms. Friedman has extensive experience developing transformational business strategies for studios and content distributors, creating product and go-to-market strategies for consumer video services and conducting market and competitive diligences. Her additional focus areas include performance improvement and value creation, pre-merger strategic integration planning, strategic due diligence and operating model development. Some of Ms. Friedman’s clients include major pay television distributors, Hollywood studios, local broadcasters, digital publishers and tech giants.

Ms. Friedman joined FTI Consulting from Accenture, where she spent more than six years in their Communications, Media and Technology industry practice. While at Accenture, she consulted for a broad set of new and traditional media-focused clients developing growth initiatives that addressed disruptive market trends, including shifting business models, convergence of content windows, digital distribution and emerging technology. Prior to Accenture, Ms. Friedman was a Finance Manager at Time Inc., where her focus was on digital advertising finance. Before that, Ms. Friedman started her career as Post Production Coordinator for Warner Bros. Animation.

Relevant Experience:

• Developed and implemented a long-term video strategy for a U.S. internet service provider centered on offering flexibility and choice to customers, including introducing the sell-through of third party video services, repricing first party video packages to ensure profitability and optimizing video offerings to eliminate low-value content
• Assessed a major sports league’s content production model and designed a transformation plan, including a new operating model that optimized production efficiency through specialized centers of excellence, identifying about $15 million savings
• Supported a leading, global Spanish-language media company to design the go-to-market strategy for the Latin American launch of their new subscription video on demand service
• Developed detailed programming synergy models for consumer video services during pre-merger integration planning, identifying over $3 billion in annual operating expenditure reduction
• Designed and market tested a new ancillary business for a regional sports network to offer white-label production and distribution services