Jon J. Franklin

Jon J Franklin (aka "Jon Franklin") is a sports marketing and sports television business executive who is currently Chief Executive Officer of Glory Sports International, the parent company of Glory Kickboxing seen on ESPN TV and CBS in the USA along with UFC Fightpass (in a major deal announced in 2016) and on major networks including Eurosport, Ziggo Sports Holland, Le TV China and others in more than 170 countries. Since Franklin joined Glory as CEO in 2014, Glory Kickboxing has undergone a complete strategic remake and seen solid advances in ratings, attendance and following culminating in John Malone's Liberty Global and Yao Ming's Yao Capital joining Glory as investors and partners. In the final months of 2016, Glory produced events in Trenton, New Jersey, Denver, Colorado, Nice, France and on December 10, a sold out major global PPV event in conjunction with the UFC, Collision, Rico v Badr, the fight no one thought could be made, in Oberhausen, Germany. Further Glory events for 2017 have included Glory LA Live, January 20 and a sold out show at Sears Center Chicago, February 24th. In Europe Brussels Belgium hosted Glory on March 25th, and Copenhagen is set for April, Holland for May, Paris for June and New York, Madison Square Garden for July 14. Franklin has stated his intent to bring Glory to Toronto Canada, to San Paulo, Brazil and also to China in 2017.

Prior to Glory, Franklin was a Vice President of IMG Media, President of Golden Gloves LLC Boxing, President of a division of America Presents - Boxing, and President of The Sports and Entertainment Company (Sports-EntCo). At IMG Media for 15 years Franklin ran the Winter and Olympic Sports divisions and managed a number of Olympic and World Champion athletes. While at IMG, he sold the title sponsorship of FIS World Cup Skiing to Cafe de Colombia in a multiyear multimillion-dollar deal. At Sports-EntCo, Franklin concluded significant sponsorship deals for Olympic athletes such as Bode Miller and Julia Mancuso and managed global sports marketing programs for Barilla Pasta, Rip It Energy Fuel, Rolex Watch USA, LaCroix Spring Water and other product and service companies. Further Franklin was the promoter of X Games Champion skateboarder Danny Way's world-renowned jump over the Great Wall of China. As President of Golden Gloves Marketing LLC, Franklin promoted the Golden Gloves National Championships in the early 2000s bringing this storied brand back to National television (on Fox Sports) after a 20-year lapse. In addition he brought in the US Army as Golden Gloves title sponsor. While at America Presents Franklin was an integral part of the team that promoted Mike Tyson fights from Francis Botha through Brian Nielson. At that time Franklin also managed all fights for the Fox Sunday Night Fights and promoted a number of Pay-per-View events including David Reid vs. Felix Trinidad (in conjunction with Don King). In 2014 and 2015 under the Sports-EntCo banner, Franklin executive produced television events for Iron Mike Tyson Productions for International syndication along with Fox and Spike Networks. This followed the successful promotion and television production of over 30 International WSB inaugural professional boxing matches on Versus and NBC Sports initially for IMG Media and later for AIBA, the governing body of Olympic boxing.

Summer: At the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing China, Franklin worked with AIBA and IMG Media to announce the World Series of Boxing programs opening the door for professional boxers to retain Olympic eligibility. At the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London England, Franklin served as Broadcast Supervisor for Boxing for the International Olympic Committee's Olympic Broadcast Services (OBS) and AIBA. Along the way, Franklin was instrumental as a consultant to AIBA, designing a plan to help bring professional boxers to the 2016 Olympics. To set the stage for this historical change for fighters, he produced the USA and England AIBA WSB Boxing series of over 30 fights for Versus Television and NBC Sports Network.

Winter: While at IMG- Media and later with Sports-EntCo, Franklin worked with athletes and managed sponsor programs at every Winter Olympic Games from the 1988 Calgary, Canada Winter Olympic Games through the 2006 Torino, Italy Winter Olympic Games.

Franklin, an INT slalom waterski competitor, was the television analyst for the Waterski World Cup for Versus Television and Outdoor Life Networks through the 1990s.

In the course of his television production career, Franklin has won numerous television awards including Telly and Aurora awards for TV production for sport shows on Fox, ESPN, CBS and other networks.