Burke Rises To COO at Comcast

Comcast Corp. pulled off a long-awaited reorganization of its management team last week, upping cable division president Steve Burke to chief operating officer and giving added responsibility to two other senior-level executives.

Burke, who retains the title of Comcast Cable president along with his new COO title, came to Comcast in 1998, after serving as president of The Walt Disney Co.’s ABC broadcasting.

Burke has been largely credited with the successful integration of Comcast’s acquisition of AT&T Broadband in 2002, and played a key role in Comcast’s abandoned attempted takeover of Disney earlier this year.

This is the second top-level title change at Comcast this year. In May, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts added the title of chairman.

Comcast also assigned more to two senior managers: executive vice president of sales, marketing and customer service Dave Watson and executive vice president of finance and administration Mike Tallent.

Watson becomes executive vice president of operations and Tallent remains executive vice president of finance and administration. Comcast said the promotions will allow the two executives to play a greater role in day-to-day operations.