Reuters names Li its global tech editor

Tiffany Wu, global managing editor for editing, curation and publishing at Reuters, sent out the following announcement:

To all editorial colleagues,

I am pleased to announce that Ken Li has been appointed Global Industry Editor for Technology.

Based in New York, Ken will steer our coverage of some of the world’s most powerful and dynamic companies as they face unprecedented scrutiny from governments and regulators after decades of unfettered growth. Ken has a deep understanding of how the major players operate in this space, having covered the intersection of the media and technology businesses since 1996 and chronicled the boom, bust and boom again. His previous roles at Reuters include global media correspondent, U.S. tech, media and telecoms editor, and editor of Reuters.com.

Ken left Reuters in 2014 to join Recode as one of the founding editors of the award-winning tech news site, where he helped set editorial strategy, first as managing editor and then editor-in-chief. He subsequently went to Newsweek and ran an international news operation of about 60 journalists as executive editor.

Ken has also worked as a staff writer at the Financial Times, The Industry Standard, and the New York Daily News. He has broken many high-profile stories and also boasts his own IMDb entry – an article Ken wrote 20 years ago, “Racer X” for Vibe magazine, was the inspiration for “The Fast and the Furious” movie franchise.

Ken returned to Reuters as our media and telecoms editor in 2018. He reports to me in his new role.

I am also happy to share the news of two great additions to our global tech and media reporting teams:

Dawn Chmielewski joined us on Monday as U.S. Entertainment Business Correspondent, focusing on the intersection of Hollywood and Silicon Valley.

Dawn is an award-winning journalist who has covered business, entertainment and technology for more than three decades. Her work has appeared in some of the largest U.S. publications, including Forbes, USA Today, U.S. News & World Report and the Los Angeles Times.

As a senior editor at Recode, she won awards for her coverage of the devastating cyberattack on Sony Pictures Entertainment. Her multi-part series for the LA Times exposed a child pedophile scandal in Hollywood and resulted in a change in California law to require background checks for talent agents, managers and others with unsupervised access to young actors and models. She has also revealed deception in Bausch & Lomb’s marketing of contact lenses – sparking a $68 million class-action lawsuit in Boston, Massachusetts – and she triggered a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ investigation of violations of the Buy America act by contractors working on the billion-dollar expansion of Fort Drum in New York.

“Binge Times,” a book Dawn co-authored on the inside story behind Hollywood’s plot to take down Netflix in the battle for streaming video supremacy, will hit bookshelves next year. Based in Los Angeles, Dawn reports to Ken Li.

Eduardo Baptista will join us as China Technology Correspondent, a newly-created position covering industry policy and the intersection of China’s vast tech sector, regulation and society.

Eduardo worked previously at the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong, covering a range of topics from COVID-19 to diplomacy as a general news reporter on the China desk. He has also written for outlets including the Economist, CNN and Nikkei Asian Review.

A dual national of Portugal and South Korea, Eduardo is fluent in seven languages including Mandarin. He studied history at the University of Cambridge and completed his Master’s Degree in Journalism from the University of Hong Kong last year after earning a Master’s in China Studies from Peking University. His hobbies include learning languages as well as basketball and soccer.

Eduardo will initially be based in Hong Kong when he starts on Oct 26, ahead of a planned move to Beijing. He will report to Brenda Goh.

Please join me in congratulating Ken and in welcoming Dawn and Eduardo to Reuters.