He was a key force in building a range of television channels including Sundance Channel, HBO, Cinemax and Financial News Network (now CNBC). David Meister’s entrepreneurial vision and business strategies have revolutionized the Media & Marketing industries.

Mr. Meister founded The Tennis Channel, the world’s leading “tennis-caster”, which he ran as Chairman and CEO for five years. During this period, TTC acquired Rights to 44 of the Top 50 tennis events, by far the strongest concentration of any targeted network (e.g., Golf Channel, Speed Channel, HBO), and struck distribution deals with cable operators to access more than 50 million subscribers, with an unprecedented average contract life of more than 12 years. Previously, he created The Sundance Television Channel, bringing his idea to entertainment legend Robert Redford, and striking a deal with Viacom to co-venture the film channel. Earlier in his career, while Mr. Meister was president of CNBC fore-runner, Financial News Network, he acquired The Learning Channel, and helped build both networks during their formative years. These successes followed his tenure at HBO, where he built HBO Sports, founded HBO Enterprises (including HBO International), and launched Cinemax, while serving simultaneously as president of Time-Life Films.

Mr. Meister began his career in Advertising, serving as Media Director at the Carl Ally agency, following stints at Interpublic, Young & Rubicam, and Benton & Bowles, where he worked for such blue chip marketers as Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Federal Express, Chrysler, Goodyear, Traveler’s Insurance, and PepsiCo. At Benton & Bowles, he helped pioneer Brand Development Indexing, and at Y & R, in response to General Foods, he developed the Barter Advertising strategy, which has been a main stay of top marketers for decades. Later, he applied a variation of this on behalf of P & G, in their unprecedented acquisition of the Time Life Films movie library. This “outside-the-box” perspective has been a staple of Meister’s business career, manifest recently by The Tennis Channel’s “rental” of Comedy’s Central’s Distribution Field Force.

Mr. Meister also served as Head of Broadcasting for Major League Baseball, reporting to Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, responsible for their world-wide broadcasting and cable activities, and also found time to create a novel that was an Edgar finalist for Best Paperback Mystery of the Year. Meister has won several CableACE Televison Programming prizes, and was awarded the President's Award by the National Cable Television Association, where he served on the Executive Council of the Satellite Network Committee. He also has been Chairman of the Under-30 Program of the International Radio and Television Society; sat on the International Council of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences; and served on the NCTA's ACE Awards Committee as Chairman of the Definitions Subcommittee. And, for more than 35 years, he has served on the Boards of The Royce Funds, a $20 Billion Mutual Fund Complex, with one of the best records on Wall Street.

Mr. Meister has appeared in numerous media, ranging from The New York Times and CNN to TV Guide and Jeopardy, and has been an advocate of industry issues in front of Congress. As a manager, he has been instrumental in the careers of executives who went on to become media luminaries as Presidents of ABC Television, CBS Television Network, Madison Square Garden, and 20th Century Fox TV Distribution

Mr. Meister is a graduate of Brown University, and earned an MBA from Columbia University. He and his wife Joan live in Pacific Palisades, California, where he continues to be one of the world's most mediocre tennis players.

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