David P. Kaplan Promoted to Senior Vice-President and Intellectual Property Counsel, Worldwide Anti-Piracy Operations, Warner Bros. Entertainment

David P. Kaplan has been named Senior Vice-President and Intellectual Property Counsel, Worldwide Anti-Piracy Operations, Warner Bros. Entertainment, it was announced today by Darcy Antonellis, President, Warner Bros. Technical Operations. Kaplan, formerly Vice President, Intellectual Property Counsel and an original member of the Anti-Piracy Department when it was created in 2004, will be responsible for the coordination and facilitation of the Studio’s anti-piracy strategy and execution on a global basis, reporting to Antonellis.

“Four yeas ago, Warner Bros. became the first Studio to create a dedicated Anti-Piracy organization. Since that time, as a Studio and as an industry, we have seen considerable progress, some key victories and clearly, some ongoing challenges. David has been an integral part of our efforts, overseeing our litigation and enforcement efforts in conjunction with the MPA as well as our efforts in the Asia Pacific region,”said Antonellis.

"The Studio and industry has taken lessons learned from the music industry and from trends that we’ve directly experienced from an evolving pirate market. Through the collective efforts across our company and with industry colleagues, we’ve significantly improved the security and protection of our content while accelerating the availability of it worldwide in physical and digital distribution.

Our business development strategies benefit from understanding the trends in the piracy market. Therefore, the team’s structure has been adjusted to reflect its changing focus—not just on revenue protection but revenue growth.”

As part of the realignment, Lucia Rangel has added responsibilities for the Asia-Pacific region to her oversight of Latin America, becoming Vice President, Anti-Piracy Operations, Latin America and Asia-Pacific. Sean Mok, previously Director, China Anti-Piracy Enforcement is now Director, Anti-Piracy Operations, Greater China and Southeast Asia, reflecting his increased scope of responsibilities. He is based in the region and will report to Rangel.

Kaplan has been with the Studio since 1996. He previously worked at Katten, Muchin & Zavis and prior to that, at Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher, specializing in intellectual property and entertainment related litigation. He graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University and received his JD from Boalt Hall at the University of California at Berkeley.

Ethan Applen, Director, Technology and Business Strategy, will be responsible for evaluating emerging anti-piracy technologies as well as those that might provide opportunities to the Studio’s various business divisions. Applen joins the Studio from IMEEM, INC, where he was Director, Business Development. He previously was a Strategic Business Analyst for Strategic Vision Consulting. He received an MBA from the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California.

Ben Karakunnel, Director, Business Intelligence, will be responsible for researching and analyzing data and information, interpreting piracy trends and statistics and disseminating the information to the Studio’s various commercial divisions for use in their strategic planning. Karakunnel was previously Associate Director, Research, Fox Home Entertainment for 20th Century Fox and Director, Research, for the Motion Picture Association of America.