William Burton

William Burton is senior vice president, Daytime, Sports and Syndicated Development/Production, ABC Entertainment, reporting to Karey Burke, president, ABC Entertainment.

In this role, Burton is responsible for the creation and production of all syndicated programming across ABC platforms including identifying, developing and managing new on-air talent and executive-producing teams. This includes a new daytime talk show with Tamron Hall currently in development for fall 2019. In addition, Burton will work on new strategic opportunities to maximize all sports content on ABC and will collaborate with a variety of departments and divisions within ABC and ESPN, as well as with teams inside Disney’s Direct-to-Consumer and International segment’s Global Content Sales and Distribution and Disney Ad Sales divisions, as appropriate. Burton will also lead all business operations of ABC Daytime including “General Hospital,” which celebrated the show’s 55th anniversary in 2018.

Most recently, Burton served as president and general manager at KGO-TV in the Bay Area since 2011. He previously served as executive vice president, Digital Media, for the ABC Owned Television Stations Group, from 2006 to 2011.

Earlier in his career, he was vice president, Programming, Advertising and Promotion, and director of Creative Services at ABC Owned KABC-TV in Los Angeles, from 1994 to 2006. Burton also served as director of Creative Services at then-Capital Cities/ABC’s WPVI-TV in Philadelphia, where he began as a promotion writer/producer.

Prior to joining WPVI-TV and the ABC Owned Television Stations Group, Burton was a promotion writer/producer at KUSA-TV in Denver.

Burton served on the board of directors for The Taylor Family Foundation. He is a graduate of the University of Colorado, Boulder, with a Bachelor of Arts in political science.