Marcos Santana is stepping down as President of Telemundo Global Studios and will assume a new multi-year role as advisor and executive producer.
Starting January 2022, he will focus on select original productions, including the third season of La Reina del Sur, while pursuing other independent opportunities.
Santana spent 14 years in leadership roles at Telemundo. He was named president of Telemundo Global Studios in 2018.
Following his departure as the head of TGS, Karen Barroeta, EVP of Production and Development at Telemundo Global Studios and Juan Ponce, SVP and General Manager of Telemundo Streaming Studios will report directly to Beau Ferrari, Chairman, NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises.
The company would not address if and when it would name a new president to replace Santana.
Barroeta will continue to oversee the development and production of long-format scripted content, talent and the head writers’ team while Ponce will carry on leading short-format scripted content exclusively designed for direct-to-consumer platforms, in addition to production operations, production design and Telemundo’s Underground Producciones in Argentina.
During his time with Telemundo, Santana held roles as President of Telemundo International and President of Telemundo International Studios and oversaw close to 40 original productions, including some of the network’s biggest hits. Among them, La Reina del Sur and El Señor de los Cielos. Most recently, he led the launch of Telemundo Streaming Studios.
Prior to joining Telemundo, Santana was president and chief operating officer of Tepuy International, a production and programming distribution company which he founded in 1989, which was acquired at the end of 2006 by NBCUniversal Telemundo to form Telemundo Internacional.