David Beal was appointed president of National Geographic Entertainment in October 2007. This new unit combines into a single operating group National Geographic's Cinema Ventures, Feature Films, Kids Entertainment, Home Entertainment and Music & Radio divisions.



Formerly president of National Geographic Music & Radio, Beal was instrumental in the success of the recently launched Nat Geo Music cable channel in Europe, the new global radio service, the creation of the Society's music Web site and National Geographic Cinema Ventures' upcoming distribution of the groundbreaking "U2 3D" feature film in January 2008,

In addition, Beal has brought in high-level musical talent to other projects in the Society, including Peter Gabriel, who served as executive music producer and performer on the giant-screen film "Sea Monsters: A Prehistoric Journey"; Aimee Mann and Grant Lee Phillips, who wrote and performed on the feature film "Arctic Tale". He was also involved in the Kokua Festival, a television special featuring Jack Johnson, Ben Harper, Willie Nelson and Damian Marley, which aired worldwide on the National Geographic Channel on Earth Day 2007.



Before joining National Geographic full-time, Beal worked with National Geographic Digital Media on the successful launch of worldmusic.nationalgeographic.com in July 2006.



Formerly, as president of Palm Pictures, Beal oversaw the creative divisions of Palm, including film, DVD, interactive technologies and magazine publishing. At Palm he worked with Chairman Chris Blackwell to implement a multi-platform strategy, developing global niche brands and releasing some of the leading titles in audio/visual entertainment.



Prior to his position as the president of Palm, Beal had a diverse career, ranging from being the CEO of an award-winning Web technology company to film scoring, music production and performing as a drummer/programmer with such acts as Madonna, Peter Gabriel, Joe Cocker and Julian Lennon. His most widely known musical film production is his collaboration with U2's Larry Mullen and Adam Clayton on the Grammy-nominated "Theme From Mission: Impossible."