Director, Product Management - Sports Content

Nielsen is dedicated to providing powerful insights that drive client decisions and deliver extraordinary results in the media landscape. The Director, Product Management - Sports Content will oversee the sports data and monetization stack, ensuring real-time data infrastructure and predictive analytics meet high compliance and performance standards.

Responsibilities:

• Architect and operate high-throughput, low-latency data pipelines serving mission-critical sports betting operations — sustaining sub-500ms latency from live event data ingestion to actionable output delivery
• Own the platform's real-time data orchestration infrastructure, including live player tracking, biometric feeds, and broadcast telemetry ingestion at scale
• Define infrastructure standards, reliability requirements, and incident response protocols for a system where latency or failure has direct legal and financial consequences for clients
• Build and own proprietary ML models including dynamic win probability, player impact metrics, and injury risk modeling — these become Nielsen IP and serve as the quantitative basis for media rights negotiations, athlete contract valuations, and betting market operations
• Own model accuracy standards, validation frameworks, and continuous improvement roadmaps for all predictive analytics products within the sports module
• Lead fan ID and LTV modeling infrastructure across all consumer touchpoints — building a first-party data asset driving PPV, premium merchandise, and event ticket revenue
• Define the fan conversion attribution framework, enabling statistically verified forecasting of paid subscriber conversion from sports content consumption
• Own the global rights and distribution compliance engine governing geo-fencing, windowing, and exclusivity across multi-territory media rights agreements — with a 100% adherence, zero-leakage standard
• Partner with Legal and Rights teams to translate complex multi-territory agreements into enforceable platform enforcement logic
• Own the AI-curated highlight generation product, with performance benchmarked against elite human editorial standards
• Define editorial quality standards and AI model selection criteria for real-time content curation
• Develop sponsorship exposure analytics that enable major brands and agencies to measure, justify, and renew large-scale investments — with accuracy validated against independently audited market rates
• Own the sponsorship valuation methodology and ensure analytical credibility sufficient to command premium pricing
• Represent the sports module in enterprise client relationships with betting operators, broadcast networks, leagues, and brand sponsors at the most senior levels
• Partner with Sales and BD on revenue strategy, contract structure, and expansion within key sports accounts

Requirements:

• 10–15+ years in product management, data engineering, or technical strategy, with at least 5 years in a senior or executive-level role
• Demonstrated experience building or leading real-time data products in sports, media, betting, or adjacent industries — hands-on ownership of low-latency infrastructure products strongly preferred
• Track record of developing or overseeing proprietary ML/predictive analytics products that generated defensible IP, not just commodity model implementations
• Experience with global rights management, geo-fencing, or multi-territory compliance in a media or broadcast context is a strong differentiator
• Deep understanding of real-time data pipeline architecture (Kafka, Flink, or equivalent), low-latency infrastructure design, and reliability engineering at scale
• Proficiency with ML model development, validation frameworks, and productionization for sports analytics use cases (win probability, player valuation, injury modeling)
• Familiarity with sports betting regulatory landscape, media rights structures, and sponsorship measurement methodologies
• Understanding of fan identity resolution, LTV modeling, and first-party data strategy in sports and entertainment contexts
• Operates with executive-level independence in a high-stakes, high-compliance environment — routine architectural decisions do not require escalation
• Credible at the most senior levels with betting operators, broadcast networks, leagues, and investment firms
• Demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional teams (engineering, data science, compliance, commercial) around shared platform objectives
• Comfortable operating in greenfield conditions — no legacy infrastructure, no established playbook, high accountability