- Linda Yaccarino is leaving NBCUniversal, where she's been its advertising chief.
- Yaccarino is reportedly Elon Musk's likely candidate to replace him as Twitter's CEO.
Linda Yaccarino is leaving NBCUniversal on the heels of reports that she's the likely contender to replace Elon Musk as Twitter's CEO.
Yaccarino, who has headed up advertising sales at NBCUniversal since 2011, was departing "effective immediately," according to a statement by the company on Friday morning.
"It has been an absolute honor to be part of Comcast NBCUniversal and lead the most incredible team," Yaccarino said in the statement.
Yaccarino has been in talks with Musk to take over as Twitter's chief, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing unidentified sources. The New York Times and Washington Post have since matched that reporting. Yaccarino had interviewed Musk in April at an ad industry conference in Miami.
Musk tweeted on Thursday that he'd picked a new chief executive for Twitter, but didn't share any details other than that "She will be starting in ~6 weeks!"
A representative for NBCUniversal did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment. Insider's emails sent to Musk's Tesla and SpaceX addresses did not receive a response. An email sent to Twitter's press address received an automated reply that did not comment on the matter.
Yaccarino is a longtime and well-respected ad executive with deep ties to advertisers. At NBCUniversal, her career and purview has grown over the years as NBCUniversal's pitch has shifted to include more data-driven digital offerings — pitting NBCUniversal against tech giants like Google and Meta.
She was a key contributor to NBCU's push into streaming TV, with the rollout of the ad-supported version of streaming service Peacock in 2020.
Yaccarino has long been a strong advocate for changing the long-established ways that advertisers buy and measure TV ads. Back in 2017, for instance, she was trying to convince TV ad buyers to purchase audiences across NBCUniversal's linear and digital content portfolio, which at the time was an unusual strategy for a broadcaster.
Yaccarino has also been a thorn in the side of legacy ratings giant Nielsen. She played a key role in NBCUniversal's move away from Nielsen ratings, and has tried to influence the rest of the TV industry to follow suit. Under Yaccarino, NBCUniversal has offered to let advertisers buy ads using non-Nielsen ratings from competitors like VideoAmp and iSpot.tv.
And Yaccarino spearheaded other big industry-wide initiatives like running less commercials on linear TV.
Mark Marshall, another longtime NBCUniversal ad exec and formally president of ad sales and client partnerships, will take over Yaccarino's role on an interim basis, NBCUniversal said.