Jonesco, who is now on gardening leave from AOL, will take up a new role of group portal head, reporting to Sky's chief operating officer, Mike Darcey. He will be responsible for developing content through portals and other digital platforms embracing Sky properties, including Sky Sports and Sky News. He will also be responsible for the sales and marketing of digital properties.
It is understood that Paul Wright, Sky Media's head of business development, who has been overseeing digital sales, including those for third parties, will report to Jonesco. Wright was a founder of online sales house Aura Sports, which represents many football clubs.
Sky acquired Aura Sports last August, laying the foundation for Sky Media's ambitions in third-party digital sales representation. The furthering of these ambitions will now rest with Jonesco.
For some months it has been rumoured that Milligan would leave Sky. He has been widely tipped to join his former boss, Dawn Airey, Sky's managing director of channels and services, who is leaving to join a content start-up called Iostar. Milligan followed Airey to Sky from Five where she was also his boss.
However, Milligan has always insisted that he is staying at Sky and said that there was no appropriate commercial role at Iostar. Sky declined to comment on Milligan's future or to confirm Jonesco's appointment.
Last week (27 February), Media Week exclusively reported that BSkyB was poised to appoint Jonesco to a head of digital strategy role.