Creative agency elvis has hired a raft of new senior creative talent from agencies Grey and Ogilvy following a record year for new business in 2022, which saw it win 100% of the pitches it participated in. Multi-award-winning Creative Director Alexandru Vasile joins elvis from Grey, where he spent two years working on brands in the Coca Cola portfolio and on the global Tuborg account. During this time, Vasile also developed the PETA “Octocurse” campaign, named as one of the best 30 ads of 2022. Vasile has 11 years of advertising industry experience, previously holding positions at creative agency McCann Bucharest, and the WPP-owned GTB in London. Over the course of his career, he has picked up multiple awards, including Cannes Lions, Eurobest Awards, LIAs, Effies and D&AD Awards. In his new role at elvis, Vasile will lead the creative department and work to further build the quality of the agency’s output, with a focus on delivering award-winning and industry-defining creative work. He will report to Executive Creative Director, Neale Horrigan. The agency has also appointed creative team Susie Nagel-Davies and Adam Ablo, who join from Ogilvy as Senior Creatives. At Ogilvy, they developed work for the global Dove and Hellman’s accounts. Prior to joining Ogilvy in January 2022, Nagel-Davies was at The Leith Agency, working on Irn-Bru, German Doner Kebab and the Scottish Government, while Ablo was at VCCP, developing work for brands including Cadbury, J2O and Bensons For Beds. In their new positions at elvis, Nagel-Davies and Ablo are tasked with creating game-changing, unexpected and unforgettable work for the agency’s clients. They will have reporting lines into both Horrigan and Vasile.
UK social creative agency THE FIFTH, known for its viral creator marketing campaigns, has announced the appointment of Lucy Smart as Strategy and Partnerships Director for THE FIFTH TALENT and Jordan Carroll as Innovation Director for THE FIFTH. Previously at YMU Group and River Talent, Smart has 10 years of experience in the creator, content and entertainment industries. With creators moving into digitised products, podcasts, Web3 and offline assets like books and ecommerce offerings, Smart will lead the growth strategy of the digital and traditional careers of its talent roster. This includes managing the increased demand from clients for longer-term partnerships across THE FIFTH’s talent portfolio. Carroll joins from the Kairos Group and leads the innovation department with a global remit that serves both THE FIFTH and THE FIFTH TALENT. By working with individual talent to experiment with new formats, platforms and technology, the department will provide the creative agency’s strategy team with tried and tested innovation that can serve as important insights to its blue chip clients.
Zerto, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, has announced the appointment of Matt Boris as its new head of worldwide Go-to-Market. Boris, who previously led Zerto sales in the Americas and Asia, will now be responsible for driving the company’s overall GTM strategy around the globe. The appointment marks a significant investment by HPE in Zerto with a goal to double the size of the business in the next 24 months. Under Boris’ leadership, Zerto will focus on maximising growth opportunities by expanding into new markets and increasing its presence in EMEA and APAC, including Australia, Hong Kong, and Malaysia. As part of his broader role, Boris will also focus on unifying the company’s GTM strategy with Manager Service Providers (MSP) and channel partners. In addition, Zerto has appointed Ben Jenkins as sales director of Americas East and Sasha Acosta as sales director of Americas West. Along with Boris, the two roles are critical for the Zerto Americas business as it scales to meet customer demands in 2023 and beyond. The Americas roles will complement Vera Wolf, VP of sales EMEA, to build a global presence focusing on new customer acquisition, growing existing accounts, and supporting Zerto’s partner Go-to-Market strategy.
Ciara Conway joins Tyneside-founded national consultancy Opencast from Aviva, where she was Group chief architect. Conway has held senior IT roles at major banks and financial services companies such as Natwest, Lloyds, CYBG and insurance giant Aviva. She’s also worked for the European Space Agency (ESA).
Checkmarx, the global leader in application security solutions, has announced that technology executive Sandeep Johri will succeed co-founder Emmanuel Benzaquen as CEO. Benzaquen will continue to serve on the company’s Board of Directors. Johri has spent many years in Silicon Valley as an executive, founder, strategic advisor and investor. He most recently served as CEO of Tricentis, which he led for seven years from an early-stage startup to a global leader of continuous-testing software solutions. Previously, Johri held senior management roles at HP, where he created and implemented the strategy to grow the software division from $600 million in revenue to category leadership and $3.5 billion in revenue. Johri has been the founder of several VC-funded security startups such as Oblix (acquired by Oracle), Determina and Bluelane (both acquired by VMware).
Marketing industry expert Emma Springham has joined the Growth Board of tech start-up Studiospace, a matchmaking platform which connects independent agencies with major brands. Springham, who is currently Chief Marketing Officer at TSB Bank, and previously held the same role at The Post Office, says she believes Studiospace is reshaping the way marketers find talent and build long lasting business relationships. Springham is also Non-Executive Director at DPP, the media industry’s business network.
Cheshire-based B2B PR and marketing agency Skout has appointed Laaraib Khan to bolster its team through a time of growth and further client wins. Formerly from the PR agency Social, Khan joins as an account executive, bringing her experience and knowledge of the built environment industry to the business. Before carving her career in PR, Khan interned at social media marketing company Shoo Social Media and wrote content for various music publications whilst studying at Leeds Beckett University. After graduating, she then spent one year at Social supporting a wide range of clients with media relations, social media, and content writing.
Hitachi Vantara, the modern infrastructure, data management and digital solutions subsidiary of Hitachi Ltd., announced that Sheila Rohra has been named chief business strategy officer (CBSO), effective immediately. The role will enable the company to further create and execute transformative strategies and provide new ways for customers to deal with the many opportunities and challenges they are facing. Rohra reports directly to Gajen Kandiah, Hitachi Vantara’s chief executive officer, and will serve on the company’s executive committee. Most recently, Rohra served as the senior vice president and general manager, data infrastructure business at Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), where she was responsible for a $2 billion global organization focused on providing distinguished primary storage with cloud-native data infrastructure and hyper-converged infrastructure to some of the world’s top Fortune 500 companies. Prior to HPE, she spent 10 years at NetApp in several roles, including chief transformation officer and senior vice president of customer success.
Gladstone Ltd, the supplier of leisure management software in the UK & Ireland as the choice of over 500 health and leisure operators, servicing in excess of 40,000 users and 8,000,000 members across their portfolio, has announced the appointments of Steve Scales as Chief Revenue Officer, and Mike Rowland as Chief Operating Officer, as the company continues its mission to revolutionise the leisure and fitness industry. Reporting directly to Gladstone CEO, Claire Rollins, Scales will be responsible for driving revenue forward in his new role. He brings with him over twenty years of experience in leadership roles within the fitness and leisure sector. Most recently, Scales held the position of Director at not-for-profit industry association ukactive, where his responsibilities included creating solutions to allow the industry to grow sustainably – highly applicable for his new role at Gladstone. Incoming Chief Operating Officer, Mike Rowland is leaving behind a twenty-four-year career with building society Nationwide where for the last twelve years he held senior roles in Digital from Head of Digital Operations to Head of Innovation. This offers an exciting opportunity to switch industries, but the process of spearheading the modernisation of an industry is something Rowland is very familiar with. Prior to that, Rowland was the Project Manager for the implementation of online banking for Nationwide and helped deliver an app tool allowing customers to contact via live chat.
Ozone, a UK premium digital advertising platform built for brands, by publishers, has appointed Stephen Windegaard to the new position of Programmatic Sales Lead. Reporting directly to Craig Tuck, Chief Revenue Officer, Windegaard will be responsible for building and nurturing Ozone’s relationships with the programmatic operations and trading desks of UK agencies and advertisers. Windegaard joins Ozone with a wealth of programmatic experience gained in premium publishing. During a near five-year stint at Future, he held the role of Commercial Group Head – Programmatic for EMEA and LATAM across the company’s portfolio of tech, gaming, music, film, football, home, creative, cycling and B2B titles. Prior to this, Windegaard spent a decade at Haymarket Media, working across titles including FourFourTwo, Stuff, What Hi-Fi?, Autocar and WhatCar?.
Seeblue, orchestrated ABM specialists for B2B technology companies, has appointed Luke Porter as Director of Client Services and Growth. Porter joins from The Marketing Practice where he was Head of Strategy & Growth and founding member of TMP’s Australian division. As Director of Client Services and Growth, Porter will oversee Seeblue’s strategy for business development and the delivery of world-class direct and channel-based Account Based Marketing (ABM) campaigns.
Akeneo, the product experience company, has announced the appointment of former Amazon Technology and Product Vice President, Tim Kohn, to Technology and Product Advisor at Akeneo. In this role, Kohn will serve as a mentor to Akeneo’s world-class engineering team and will directly contribute to further developing the Akeneo Product Cloud offerings. Kohn most recently served as Vice President of Video Experience Technology at Prime Video, responsible for the Prime Video app on all platforms, commerce, content discovery, personalised recommendations and content compliance. Prior to that, Kohn operated as Vice President of Networking and Amazon Web Services, where he managed all aspects of the Amazon network, including network designs, hardware and software development, operations and network interconnection business development. Before his Vice President roles, Kohn worked for Amazon.com, having overseen product classification, product data auditing, and the development of algorithmic techniques for enhancing data quality.
GumGum has announced new hires in Germany, with Kalina Kehayova joining as Digital Executive and Larissa Jürges as Programmatic Solutions Manager, as the contextual-first, global digital advertising platform continues to attract strong interest from advertisers across the DACH region. Previously Account Manager at Teads, Jürges has worked in the media industry for many years and has a BA in Media Management and an MA in Corporate Communications. Based out of Hamburg, she will provide clients and agencies with maximum support to run successful campaigns using GumGum’s innovative technology. Kehayova, based out of Düsseldorf, will be focused on new client acquisition, establishing partnerships with existing clients and developing long-term collaborations. Previously Campaign Manager at OMD, Kehayova has an in-depth understanding of client ambitions and challenges around programmatic in the fast-evolving marketplace. She has a degree in International Business from the Cologne University of Applied Sciences.
Kajabi, a platform helping creators turn their knowledge into sustainable online businesses, has announced Andréa Mallard, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at Pinterest, as the latest addition to the company’s board. In the inaugural role of Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at Pinterest, Mallard currently oversees brand, external communications, performance, experiential, content, insights, and product marketing globally across all Pinterest audiences. Previously, Mallard was the CMO of Athleta, a fast-growing women’s apparel brand, and Omada Health, a digital health pioneer named one of the 50 most innovative companies in the world by Fast Company.
Automated Creative has appointed Dan Moseley as Managing Director as it continues to expand in the US and Canada in response to increasing demand for its services. Moseley will continue to lead the agency’s expansion in the US and Canada. Passionate about building teams which help brands to connect with audiences in today’s exciting, complex and fast-changing cultural landscape, he has worked across Europe and on both sides of the pond, delivering global and local work for major sports, lifestyle and CPG brands such as adidas, Red Bull, General Mills, Unilever and Real Madrid. An expert in brand strategy and digital marketing, formerly Head of Client Services at We Are Social, Moseley also worked at Leo Burnett Design and Publicis Sport & Entertainment as part of a diverse career which has seen him deliver YouTube programming with adidas, launching Beats by Dre’s local and digital efforts across EMEA and delivering gaming executions for Activision and General Mills.
Kantar, the marketing data and analytics company, has appointed Simon Bailey as senior partner to its consulting practice to help clients solve their biggest brand challenges and grow their businesses. Bailey will manage Kantar’s relationships with major firms to help them navigate market fluctuation amid the current period of high inflation and changing customer behaviour. This will include advising on all aspects of commercial and creative strategy, including areas such as forecasting product and service demand, product positioning, innovation and new product development. Bailey brings to bear extensive knowledge and expertise gained from working in international and diverse markets across multiple categories including FMCG, technology, media and financial services. Bailey has been a senior brand and strategy consultant for than more 25 years, working with some of the world’s largest businesses including Orange, Philips, Reckitt Benckiser and Unilever. Bailey has extensive advisory experience as a former European CEO of Interbrand and CEO of WPPs Brand Union, where he supported the global rebrand of Vodafone.
