Mattel CEO Ynon Kreiz steps down after eight years for senior Paramount role

Mattel chief Ynon Kreiz is leaving after eight years to take a senior job at Paramount.

The toymaker said Kreiz will step down as chairman and chief executive effective Oct. 2 to take a senior leadership position at another public company, Variety reported on Sept. 30. Mattel named Condé Nast chief executive Roger Lynch as his successor. Lynch will pick up both titles, chairman and CEO, from Oct. 2.

Lynch is already inside the building. He was a Mattel board member and independent lead director at the time of the appointment, according to the company announcement. Condé Nast is the publisher behind Vogue, GQ and The New Yorker, so Lynch arrives from magazines and media rather than toys.

The other public company is Paramount. Kreiz will join David Ellison's Paramount in a senior management role, according to two industry sources cited by Variety. Mattel did not name the company in its own statement. Paramount has not publicly detailed the role.

The timing links a toy box to a very busy studio. Paramount is on the brink of closing its mega-merger with Warner Bros. Discovery, the owner of HBO, Warner Bros. and DC. The deal is valued at $111 billion. It still needs judicial approval of its settlement of an antitrust lawsuit brought by 12 state attorneys general, which is a legal challenge over whether a deal harms competition, before it can close.

Kreiz joined Mattel in 2018 and leaves as one of its longest-serving recent leaders. He was named chief executive effective April 26, 2018, after serving as a Mattel director since June 2017, according to the company. At that point he was the company's fourth chief executive in four years.

He came from screen rather than shelves. Before Mattel, Kreiz was chief executive of Maker Studios, the online video network, and he replaced Margo Georgiadis in the top job. Within months of his arrival, Mattel started a film division headed by an Oscar-nominated producer to turn its brands into film franchises.

For viewers, this is a people move with a direct line to what gets made. Kreiz spent eight years running a toymaker that also acts as a rights holder, meaning it controls which of its toys and games can become films and shows. Lynch now takes that seat, which covers the toy business and those Hollywood deals. What Kreiz does next sits inside Paramount just as Ellison tries to finalise a merger that would reshape two studio libraries.