Please Welcome TechCrunch’s New COO, Veteran Exec And Entrepreneur Ned Desmond

There’s lots going on behind the scenes here at TechCrunch — not only are we hiring top writers and putting together a kick-ass lineup for Disrupt in New York next month, we’re also getting a chief operating officer (among other moves soon to be announced).

Ned Desmond, a veteran media executive from Time Inc and more recently an entrepreneur, will be joining us as COO on May 7th. He’s going to be leading all of our non-editorial operations out of our San Francisco headquarters. He’ll also serve as the general manager of the AOL Tech properties. which include Engadget, TUAW and Joystiq.

As Heather Harde’s replacement, Desmond is filling big shoes along with the rest of us. But also like so many of us at the new TechCrunch, he’s coming in with years of experience — that began with writing, actually

He was a foreign bureau chief with Time Magazine during the 90s, and had a stint as a senior correspondent for Fortune. But he got caught up in the dot.com craze like so many others in Silicon Valley, heading up business development for then-popular search engine Infoseek before getting sucked back into the media world.

Ned began last decade as the president and editor of Business 2.0, then leveled up to be the president of Time Interactive. That job included running its digital new business development and ad operations, as well as product, design and technology support. Among other accomplishments, he led successful relaunches for People, Entertainment Weekly, InStyle, My Recipes, Life and Health. He got back into the startup world in 2009, co-founding an outdoor sports site called Go Sportn, Inc., which has become a category leader in fishing and hunting verticals.

Between his experience in startup and media operations, and his focus on creating great content, he’s going to be able to do a lot to build up TechCrunch and the other AOL Tech sites. Please give him a warm welcome.