Stefan Hadl Promoted To Hearst TV SVP, Broadcast Engineering & Technology

Stefan Hadl

Stefan Hadl, Hearst Television’s vice president of engineering since June 2019, has been promoted to senior vice president, broadcast engineering & technology.

The announcement was made Tuesday by Jordan Wertlieb, Hearst Television president.

“Stefan is an outstanding leader,” Wertlieb said. “He has been instrumental in advancing Hearst Television technology, leading our teams in the rollout of next generation television, and synthesizing the distribution of all our video assets on current and emerging platforms. Thanks to Stefan’s vision, our company is well positioned to meet the expectations of the consumer while concurrently leading and attracting extraordinary talent to embrace the industry’s important and rapid video transformation.”

As vice president of engineering, Hadl led a team that helped navigate the operation of Hearst TV stations through the pandemic both on premises and with a remote workforce, launched more than 40 additional digital multicast channels across the company’s station footprint, and drove Hearst Television’s participation in the nationwide rollout of ATSC 3.0 — aka NextGen TV — launching stations in 14 of the company’s top-20 markets with the new technology. Hadl helped create an engineering fellowship, named for Marty Faubell, his predecessor as vice president of engineering, to attract fresh talent to the industry.

Hadl is a member of numerous key industry organizations and groups, including the Advanced Television Systems Committee, the international, nonprofit organization developing voluntary standards for digital television; the National Association of Broadcasters Technology Committee; the Pearl consortium of television broadcasters helping advance NextGen TV; the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers; and the Society of Broadcast Engineers.

Joining Hearst Television in 1995, Hadl started as a broadcast engineer at KCRA, later to become part of the company’s Sacramento, Calif., duopoly, KCRA-KQCA. He was promoted to engineering supervisor and assistant chief engineer. After subsequently serving as director of engineering at Hearst Television’s WMUR Manchester, N.H., he returned to KCRA-KQCA as director of engineering.

In 2015, Hadl became director of engineering and operations of Hearst Television’s WCVB Boston. Prior to his 2019 promotion to vice president, he was director of engineering, eastern region, overseeing the engineering operations of 14 Hearst television stations as well as the company’s Baltimore radio stations.

Hadl began his career in broadcast engineering while in the United States Air Force, earning his discharge as a Television Equipment Specialist NCOIC (Level 7) at Los Angeles AFB. He holds an AS degree in electronic systems technology from USAF Community College / Chapman University and is a graduate of the Airman Leadership School and the Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) Leadership School.