Fox Sports Ups Pete Vlastelica to EVP of Digital

FOX Sports announced today that Pete Vlastelica, formerly Senior Vice President of Digital, has been promoted to Executive Vice President of Digital.  Vlastelica will continue to report to FOX Sports President and COO Eric Shanks.

“Since taking on an expanded role with FOX Sports last year, Pete has implemented a new strategic vision that is driving the evolution of our digital business,” says Shanks. “He has set us on the right course to strengthen our digital business and position it for the future.”

According the announcement, Vlastelica’s leadership helped FOX Sports to better align its digital content with its core television business in order to maximize audience growth and drive consumer awareness.  Vlastelica struck deals with leading digital companies like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter in order to create content across platforms and further enhance FOX Sports’ social audience.  He also oversaw the re-design of FOXSports.com to optimize it for mobile viewing to tap into the rapidly growing mobile audience.

Year to year, organic traffic to FOXSports.com is up 111% and referrals from search and social are up 225% and 1063%, respectively, Vlastelica leadership. Video streams on FOX Sports’ YouTube channel also jumped 1515% during that time.

Vlastelica joined FOX Sports in 2010 when the company acquired Yardbarker, which he co-founded in 2006. Earlier this month, Vlastelica was named to Sports Business Journal’s prestigious “Forty Under 40” list for the first time. Vlastelica earned an MBA from the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley and a Bachelor of Arts in Public Policy from Stanford.