Seattle Times editorial-page editor Ryan Blethen is leaving that post to head up the newspaper's new-product development efforts.

Blethen will assume the position, director of new-product strategies, effective Jan. 1, the company announced Thursday. The new editorial-page editor will be Kate Riley, now the page's associate editor.

Blethen, 39, a fifth-generation member of the family that has owned and published The Times since 1896, has been editorial-page editor since 2009. He worked as a reporter and editor at newspapers in Yakima, Spokane and Portland, Maine, before becoming a Times columnist and associate editorial-page editor in 2005.

Riley, 49, joined The Times as an editorial writer and columnist in 2002, after leaving the Tri-City Herald. She was promoted to associate editor of the page in 2008.

Riley, who reports to Times Publisher Frank Blethen in her new position, will join the Times' operating council, its senior leadership group. She is a graduate of Redmond High School and the University of Washington.

Frank Blethen, Ryan's father, said in an email to employees that Ryan Blethen's new job — developing and managing new digital and print products — is key to increasing income and continuing the newspaper's journalistic mission.

Ryan Blethen will retain his positions as Times associate publisher and member of the boards of the Times-owned Yakima Herald-Republic and Walla Walla Union-Bulletin.