Senior Vice President | NBC Universal

Dianne Festa is senior vice president of the News Partnerships team at NBC Universal where she leverages relationships with NBC owned and affiliated stations, as well as provides editorial content to stations and increases local participation on NBC News projects and major stories. In addition, she was responsible for growing NBC News and MSNBC internationally, working closely with the NBC Universal international team.

Prior to Festa joining the News Partnerships team, she coordinated the network’s election-year coverage as political editor for NBC News Decision ’96.

In 1991, Festa was named the Moscow Bureau Chief immediately following the fall of the Soviet Union and covered Russia’s transition to a market economy until 1995. During her tenure there, she directed coverage of four presidential summits and the war in Chechnya. She was among those nominated for a 1993 Emmy award for coverage of the October 1993 revolt in Moscow.

From 1989 to 1991, Festa was the Weekend News Manager. Her responsibilities at that time included coordinating worldwide news coverage for NBC News programs and specials. During the Persian Gulf War, Festa served as the acting bureau chief in
Amman, Jordan.

Previously, she worked as an assignment editor in the London Bureau from 1986 to1989. Festa began her career in 1983 working with NBC affiliates in the Florida region as NBC Miami bureau coordinator and also participated in coverage of the Grenada invasion and the civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua.

Festa graduated from Florida International University in 1983 with a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism. She lives in New York with her son, Lucas.