Geraldine Laybourne (née Bond; born May 19, 1947) is an American entrepreneur and former TV executive. She worked at Nickelodeon from 1980 until 1996, when she became the president of Disney-ABC Cable Networks (including Disney Channel). She is also the co-founder of Oxygen Media and a tech startup called Katapult. In 2020, she was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame. Early life and education Laybourne was raised in Martinsville, a rural community of about 400 in Bridgewater Township, New Jersey. She is the second of four children, born to a former radio writer/actress and community organizer and a stock broker. In 1969, Laybourne earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Art History from Vassar College. In 1971, she received a Master of Science degree in Elementary Education from the University of Pennsylvania. Career After college, Laybourne had various jobs. From 1969 to 1970, Laybourne worked at Wallace, McHarg, Roberts and Todd, an architecture firm in Philadelphia. From 1972 to 1973, she worked as a teacher at Concord Academy in Concord, Massachusetts. Then from 1974 to 1976, Laybourne worked as a festival coordinator of the New York American Film Festival. In 1974, she co-founded the Media Center for Children, which she was involved with until 1977. Laybourne said she founded the Media Center for Children because she was concerned about the media her children were watching. From 1978 to 1980, she was a partner at Early Bird Special Company in New York. Nickelodeon (1980–1996) In 1980, Laybourne was hired as a program manager at Nickelodeon, a year-old network, where she initiated the focus-group approach to programming. Laybourne was one of the first people to focus on television programming for kids. She spent 15 years at Nickelodeon, taking over the management of the network, and started accepting advertising for the network, in 1984. Laybourne and her team were responsible for creating and building the Nickelodeon brand, launching Nick at Nite and expanding the network by establishing it in other countries, developing theme parks and creating Nickelodeon magazine, movie, toy and publishing divisions. Under her leadership, Nickelodeon became the top-rated 24-hour cable programming service and won Emmy Awards, Peabody Awards, CableACE Awards and Parents' Choice Awards. The network had a 40% profit margin and explosive growth every year. Laybourne built Nickelodeon into the first global television network to profit from selling advertising targeted towards children. Her programming approach, which made a point