Francesco Marconi

Francesco Marconi is the manager of strategy and corporate development at the Associated Press, where he identifies new investment and partnership opportunities for the news agency. Francesco studied business and journalism at the University of Missouri and completed his post graduate work as a Chazen Scholar at Columbia Business School’s Media Program. In 2014 he joined Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society as an affiliate researcher studying the impact of data in journalism. Francesco started his career at the United Nations researching science and technology solutions for developing countries, resulting in the publishing of his first book and TED talk on Reverse Innovation.

Research Interests and Work

As technologies continue to iterate and improve, how will they help newsrooms improve their storytelling? Many editors already send out notifications to subscribers via smart devices such as phones and watches, while others are experimenting with automation, virtual reality and chat apps. But how do all of these platforms and projects work together? How do they alter the day-to-day jobs and skills required of journalists?

These are the questions that Francesco Marconi, the manager of strategy at The Associated Press, will be seeking to answer as an Innovation Fellow at the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University. In this role, Marconi will connect the news industry with Tow Fellows who are developing what could become the tools of tomorrow’s newsrooms.