Wall Street Journal corp team taps nine for new positions

Jamie Heller, the business editor of The Wall Street Journal, sent out the following announcement on Friday afternoon:

Hello everyone,

We have several exciting moves to share in corp.

Scott Austin has taken on a role on the business side with the partnerships team. Scott spent 19 years as a reporter and editor at The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones and in recent years honchoed some of our most important tech stories, from Tesla and Apple to Amazon and WeWork. We can’t thank him enough for his invaluable contributions to our tech coverage over the years, both in New York and San Francisco.

Kathryn Dill joins the Management & Careers bureau in New York as an early careers writer, covering the possibilities and changes facing young adults entering the workplace. Kathryn comes from CNBC, where she was careers editor of CNBC’s Work It channel, overseeing coverage of employment, leadership and women in business. Before that she was at Forbes writing about management and running the fact-checking operation, in addition to helping produce many of their lists and packages.

Ben Katz joins us Monday in London to cover aerospace and aviation. Working closely with our Chicago and LA bureaus, he will be responsible for corporate coverage of Airbus, the world’s biggest plane maker, as well as anything that flies over European airspace–including airliners, fighter jets and drones. Originally hailing from Cape Town, South Africa, Ben joins us from Bloomberg, where he was a formidable competitor of ours.

Bradley Olson joins us as an editor in the Technology Bureau in San Francisco. Brad has spent the past four years covering big oil companies for us and has broken news on a wide array of topics. He has also done extensive enterprise, including playing an integral role in the Houston bureau’s coverage this year of problems — many self-imposed — facing the shale industry. Brad, whose portfolio in San Francisco will include Apple and Amazon, has also worked for Bloomberg, the Houston Chronicle and the Baltimore Sun. He starts his new position later this year.

Preetika Rana is our new tech & transportation reporter, covering Uber and Lyft and the ways that technology and entrepreneurs are changing how people and stuff move around. Since 2016, Preetika has covered health from Hong Kong, where she has chronicled how China raced ahead of the U.S. in editing people’s DNA, and how apps and social media have helped both fuel and manage an HIV crisis in the Philippines. Preetika previously covered business for the Journal in India. We expect Preetika to move to San Francisco later this year.

Brad Reagan is deputy of our Technology Bureau in San Francisco, where he will play an even more important role working with Jason Dean to lead our tech coverage. Brad has done fantastic work since joining the bureau last year, overseeing coverage of some of the world’s biggest companies and shepherding many of our most successful and high-impact stories including on Care.com and apps and privacy. Brad previously helped lead the Journal’s sports coverage and led our banking and investing coverage. He also led much of our #MeToo coverage.

Khadeeja Safdar takes on a new business data beat in the New York Corporate Bureau covering how companies across industries are using analytics and consumer data. Khadeeja has already distinguished herself in this area with her coverage on retailers using data to decide whether to accept returns from individual consumers. Khadeeja will also continue to contribute to our retail coverage including as the beat reporter on Nike, Under Armour and L Brands. Khadeeja joined the Journal as an intern in 2013 and has been a corporate reporter since 2016.

Charity Scott joins the New York Corporate Bureau to cover online shopping, including startups like StitchFix, RealReal and Everlane as well as secondhand marketplaces like DePop and Poshmark, and efforts by social media services to capture shopping dollars. Charity, a senior editor on our social media team, recently completed the first WSJ Trust Fellowship. She joined the Journal in 2012 and has worked as an editor on WSJ.com and our mobile apps.

Khadeeja and Charity will work closely with retail reporters Sarah Nassauer and Suzanne Kapner. Sarah, who covers Walmart and other big box chains, will add coverage of Target and Best Buy to her beat. Suzanne, who covers department stores and mall stores, will add coverage of specialty chains like Gap and Lululemon to her beat.

Aaron Tilley has joined our San Francisco Technology Bureau to cover Microsoft and business technology. Aaron comes from the Information, where he distinguished himself with scoops and smart features about Apple and the hardware sector. He previously covered semiconductors and artificial intelligence for Forbes. Aaron’s beat includes Salesforce and Oracle and how technologies such as cloud computing and AI are changing the way business is done.

*****

Please look for more new opportunities in corp. As always, if you’re interested in learning more about working with us generally, please reach out to me, Preeta or George.

Congrats and welcome to all!
Jamie