An award-winning boutique publishing company, Luna Media was founded in 2004 and is based in Sydney. It produces the award-winning science magazine COSMOS, and its partner website Cosmos Online.
Luna Media was named Best Publisher at Australia's annual Bell Awards for Publishing Excellence in both 2009 and 2006, and won the Lord Mayor's Sustainability Award in 2008, given by the City of Sydney. It was founded by four people: Melbourne neuroscientist and entrepreneur Dr Alan Finkel, magazine publishing executive Kylie Ahern and science journalists Wilson da Silva and Elizabeth Finkel. More on Luna Media.
The Board of Luna Media
Chairman and Executive Publisher
Dr Alan Finkel is a neuroscientist and philanthropist, and one of the founders of COSMOS. The chairman of Luna Media Pty Ltd, publishers of COSMOS, he also chairs the magazine's Editorial Advisory Board. The Chancellor of Melbourne's Monash University, he is the winner of the 2005 Clunies Ross Medal and was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in 2006 - in both cases for his contribution to science and education. With a PhD in electrical engineering from Monash, he was a postdoctoral researcher at the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University in Canberra, where he invented a new voltage clamp that made it possible to measure the electrical activity of previously inaccessible, individual neurons in mammals. He went on to establish Axon Instruments Inc, a scientific equipment manufacturer with a global reputation, and lead it for 22 years until its acquisition in 2004.
Chief Executive Officer and Publisher
Kylie Ahern is the Publisher and co-founder of COSMOS and a rising star of publishing and science communication in Australia. The Chair of Australia's National Science Week in New South Wales, she also serves on the board of Publishers Australia, the magazine industry group. She started her career at IPC Magazines in Britain, went on to several senior roles in Australia, including Marketing Director at FPC Magazines, Group Circulation Manager at ACP Magazines and Publisher at Yaffa. A co-founder of Luna Media, in just 5 years she has lead it to a win of 41 awards across editorial, publishing and marketing, including twice Magazine of the Year for COSMOS, and twice taken out the Best Publisher trophy.
Editorial Director and Editor-in-Chief
Wilson da Silva is the creative force behind COSMOS. A former on-air science reporter for ABC TV, he has served as editor of the magazines Newton, 21C and Science Spectra, was science editor of ABC Online, has been a foreign correspondent for Reuters, is a former staff journalist on The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald newspapers and was a Sydney correspondent for New Scientist. The winner of 27 awards - including twice Editor of the Year at the annual Bell Awards for Publishing Excellence for his work on COSMOS, and the 2000 Australian Film Institute Award for Best Documentary for the East Timor film, The Diplomat- he is the past president of the World Federation of Science Journalists. more
