(Maribel Ramos-Weiner, Los Angeles). The recent TV multicultural panel, composed by some of the main pay-TV operators in the US, dealt with issues such as the importance of reliable data gathering, and the need to ramp up Hispanic market efforts within the general marketing plans of companies.The talks, organized by B&C and Multichannel News, featured a select panel of industry experts which included Jennifer Ball, Senior VP of Affiliate Marketing & Distribution of Univision Communications; Maureen Lane, VP of Programming of Time Warner Cable; Edward Morán, Director of Insight & Innovation at Deloitte Services; Philip Polk, Director of Market Segmentation at Cox Communications; and Natalie Rouse, National Director of Ethnic Marketing at Comcast. The panel concluded that the investment advertisers and pay-TV operators are making in the US Hispanic market is not proportional to the growth and purchasing power of this market segment. Maureen Lane of Time Warner Cable said that the priority for her company to invest in the multicultural market is based on the size of the Hispanic population and on their goal to become the main provider of content in Spanish for this segment.
