Pacific Content founders Steve Pratt and Chris Boyce have announced their respective departures from the Rogers Sports & Media-owned branded podcast studio.
Pratt, who formerly was Director of Digital for CBC Music for a decade, founded Pacific Content in 2014 with fellow CBC alum Jennifer Ouano. Boyce, the former Executive Director of Radio & Audio, for CBC English Services and Pratt’s former boss, came on board in 2016 as an owner and principal, in addition to business consultant Rob Leadley.
An early entrant into the branded audio space, the company quickly established itself with big name clients like McAfee, Dell, Charles Schwab, Slack, Shopify and Facebook, among others. Rogers Sports & Media acquired Pacific Content in 2019.
“After the entrepreneurial ride of a lifetime, I have made the tough decision to leave Pacific Content and Rogers Sports & Media on April 30th,” wrote Pratt in a post to LinkedIn Thursday morning. “After 8 amazing years (!), I am ready for fresh challenges and new problems to solve. I’m thrilled to be passing the torch to an amazing team of leaders and I know they will continue to evolve Pacific Content’s place as a world leader in podcast and marketing strategy & services with brands, and Frequency [Rogers’ in-house podcast network] as a successful original podcast network.”
In his own post to social media, Boyce called building Pacific Content “the most thrilling experience” of his professional life.
Today is my last day at Pacific Content. Helping build this company into what it is today has been the most thrilling experience of my professional life. It’s been a wild six year ride. 1/10
— Chris Boyce (@chrisoboyce) March 31, 2022
“In the year before I joined Pacific Content, I remember listening to Gimlet’s Startup and thinking how amazing it was that someone was starting a company just to make podcasts. It all seemed so mysterious and thrilling and impossible. I never dreamed that I’d soon be on that same path. And I certainly never dreamed that I’d be hanging out in the boardrooms of iconic brands like Ford, Dell, Adobe and Charles Schwab, working with them to make original podcasts,” wrote Boyce.
Boyce says with Pacific Content now employing more than 50 people, he has an opportunity to get back to his startup roots and in the short term will be helping his wife Suzanne build her Mail Order Mystery business, which creates mystery experiences for kids.
Pratt told Broadcast Dialogue in an email that their respective decisions to leave within weeks of each other was purely coincidental.
“There is happily no inside story on the timing, other than Chris and I were separately thinking about our individual futures, and when we shared that we were both thinking of leaving in similar time frames, we thought it would be best to coordinate and announce them together,” said Pratt. “Pacific Content is in thankfully amazing shape and off to the best start of a year we have ever had and Frequency is as well. It feels good leaving the businesses in terrific shape and with a phenomenal team of leaders, podcasting and audience development experts.”
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