Sinclair Ups John Solomon To Circa COO

Sinclair Broadcast Group today promoted John Solomon to chief operating officer of Circa from chief creative officer.

Circa is Sinclair’s mobile-friendly, video-driven news and entertainment brand launched in July that targets millennials. Solomon will report into Scott Livingston, Sinclair’s VP of news.

“In the last year that John has been with Sinclair, he has been instrumental in the immediate success of Circa,” said Livingston. “Circa has been consistently growing its digital presence and social media following. In the last few months he has expanded their content offerings with the launch of Circa Laughs and Circa 360, both of which focus on Circa’s unique storytelling style targeted to the 18-35 year-old audience.

“John, an award-winning journalist with experience in news reporting, editing and management, has lead the Circa initiative by bringing his ideas to the table on how to connect digital readers to news and by forming successful partnerships to grow the Circa brand,” Livingston added.

Solomon has been with Sinclair since December 2015 as the chief creative officer for Circa. Prior to that he was the editor and VP for content and business development for The Washington Times since 2013.

His other roles included executive editor for the Center for Public Integrity and director of news for Newsweek and The Daily Beast. He has also been president of the Packard Media Group LLC, since 2009.

After starting in college as a sports reporter for United Press International, he worked for two decades at the Associated Press as a reporter, news editor, multimedia investigative editor and assistant Washington bureau chief until joining the Washington Post in 2007 as its national investigative reporter.

Solomon is the author of DSK: The Scandal That Brought Down Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

He graduated magna cum laude from Marquette University with a B.A. in journalism.