Bob Bowman was appointed President, Business & Media of Major League Baseball by Commissioner Robert D. Manfred, Jr. on December 4, 2014. He directs revenue-generating and media rights activities across all MLB entities while continuing to oversee MLB Advanced Media, LP (MLBAM) and MLB Network. Bowman has been President & Chief Executive Officer of MLBAM, the league’s world-class technology company, since its inception in 2000.
Bowman joined MLBAM in 2000 following two years of work in the Internet space. He took on oversight of MLB Network in 2014. MLBAM was created in January 2000, when the owners of the 30 Major League Clubs voted to follow the recommendation of Commissioner Selig and centralize all of Baseball’s Internet and Interactive Media operations under one roof. MLBAM operates the official League site, MLB.com, as well as each of the 30 individual team sites. It also develops, deploys and distributes the highest grossing iOS app, At Bat, as well as manages live video content for dozens of clients. Annually, MLBAM captures, encodes and distributes more than 30,000 live video events. MLB.com is an award-winning multimedia business at the forefront of the digital revolution.
Prior to joining MLBAM, Mr. Bowman was President and Chief Operating Officer of ITT Corporation, one of the world’s largest and preeminent conglomerates. He joined ITT in 1991 as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of ITT Sheraton, the Boston-based global hotel network. In 1992, he was named Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of the parent company before being named President and Chief Operating Officer in 1995. Following the trivestiture of the Company’s business divisions in 1995, Mr. Bowman successfully oversaw the growth and operations of the $8 billion conglomerate until its merger with Starwood Hotels and Resorts in 1998. During his tenure, Mr. Bowman and the senior management team at ITT created more than $25 billion of value for the company’s shareholders.
Before joining ITT, Bowman served as Treasurer for the State of Michigan from 1983-1991. The youngest State Treasurer in the nation at the time of his appointment, during his eight-year term the State’s pension system grew from $6 billion to $19 billion in asset value, and improved the State’s credit rating from BBB to AA.
Immediately prior to his appointment in Michigan, Bowman also worked as a municipal finance investment banker with Goldman Sachs & Company, and from 1979 to 1981 he served in the U.S. Department of the Treasury as Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for Domestic Finance. In that role, he worked on both the New York City Loan Guarantee Act and the Chrysler Loan Guarantee Act.
A native of Milwaukee, Bowman graduated from Harvard College in 1977, and received his M.B.A. from The Wharton School in 1979. Bowman serves as President of the Michigan Education Trust and is a member of the Board of Directors of Take-Two Interactive Corp., Vince Holding Corp. and Lands’ End, Inc.
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