In October, Vice Media hired away Bloomberg Businessweek editor Josh Tyrangiel to oversee the in-development daily Vice News HBO show.
The new head of Vice News is firing some and will hire more
Ex-Bloomberg editor Josh Tyrangiel is putting his mark on the company.
Today, Tyrangiel is getting a bigger job. The company is promoting him to run all of Vice News, and laying off at least 15 digital staffers. Under the new arrangement, Tyrangiel will supervise both the weekly and upcoming daily Vice News HBO shows, as well as Vice News’ digital operations.
Sources tell Recode that Tyrangiel’s promotion signals broader changes at Vice News. Whether that includes more cuts is unclear, but likely. For the moment, Tyrangiel has already begun putting his stamp on Vice News with some recent major hires.
According to a Vice spokesman, “there are no further plans to let anybody else go.”
Tyrangiel, who was responsible for the successful reinvention of Bloomberg Businessweek magazine, recently hired away New York Times editor Ryan McCarthy to become the editor in chief of Vice News online. He has also tapped ex-NBC News producer Madeleine Haeringer as executive producer of the daily HBO program and brought in New York Times writer Ravi Somaiya as a tech reporter.
Since launching in 2014, Vice News hired rapidly across the globe. Part of Tyrangiel’s job now, sources indicate, won’t just involve hiring more people as Vice News readies new bureaus in places like San Francisco and Hong Kong. He may also have to cut loose many of the employees that Vice News picked up in its hiring spree of the last couple years.
Politico first broke the news of Tyrangiel’s promotion and the layoffs, and a Vice spokesman directed Recode to Politico’s report. A Vice News correspondent in England tweeted that three full-time employees from the UK division were also fired on Tuesday.
As part of Tyrangiel’s plan, Vice News expects to hire more editorial staffers — in addition to the ones it has added in recent months — to replace the ones it is firing. This sounds similar to what Gawker Media announced last fall.
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
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