Buy.com has hired Bernard Luthi as chief marketing officer for the online marketplace. Luthi’s 15 years of e-commerce experience includes executive positions at Newegg.com and PC Mall Inc. Buy.com is No. 32 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide. PC Mall is No. 52 and Newegg is No. 12. At Buy.com, Luthi will oversee web site experience, advertising, BuyTV, public relations and promotions. He also will work on corporate branding with Buy.com parent company Rakuten, which bought Buy.com in 2010 for $250 million."Bernard's knowledge of online retailing and channel product marketing will be a huge asset to Buy.com, as we work to increase our value to product vendors and marketplace sellers, while continuing to build loyalty among our diverse customer-base," says Neel Grover, Buy.com CEO and president. "With our plans for increasing growth under our parent company Rakuten, his deep experience and marketing acumen will give us a strong competitive advantage." Luthi started at Newegg in December 2006 as vice president for marketing and merchandising, ascending to senior vice president with oversight also of web management and customer service. Between June 2004 and December 2006, he worked as PC Mall’s vice president of marketing and category management, according to his LinkedIn account. Before that, he was director of product marketing for technology distributor and logistics firm Ingram Micro.
Buy.com (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners is please to announce Miles Reidy as the new Chief Financial Officer for Audax Health Solutions. Miles joined Audax Health from Network Solutions where he served as their Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Reidy joined Network Solutions from Sears Holdings Corporation where he was Executive Vice President and CFO. During his tenure as CFO for Sears Holding Company, Mr. Reidy led the development of strategy and financial management for the multi-billion dollar retailer. Prior to this role, he spent more than eight years at Capital One Financial Corporation, leading activities in banking integration, corporate planning and financial strategy. In addition he served as the CFO for Capital One Credit Card and Bank. Mr. Reidy’s experience also includes senior posts at a number of large commercial banks. Mr. Reidy received his Bachelor of Science in Finance from the Georgetown University and his Master of Science in Economics, from the Heinz School of Public Policy at Carnegie-Mellon University. Audax Health Solutions' mission is to combine the power of social networking with provider-based clinical and plan-based benefit management information.
Audax (Corporate Website)
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NEW YORK, Dec. 12, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Weight Watchers International, Inc.(NYSE: WTW) today announced the appointment of Colin Watts as Senior Vice President, Wellness and Global Innovation, effective January 3, 2012. Watts will oversee the Company's North American B2B/Healthcare business operations in addition to its Global Innovation and Consumer Insights teams. Watts will report to David A. Burwick, President, North America.
Watts brings a broad range of experiences in general management, marketing and innovation from consumer and healthcare companies. Most recently, he served as Corporate Vice President and Chief Innovation Officer at Walgreen Co. where he was in charge of the recently created Corporate Innovation Division. Prior to this position atWalgreens, Watts had significant senior leadership roles at Johnson & Johnson as President of McNeil Nutritionals Worldwide and McNeil Consumer Healthcare Worldwide. In these roles, he was responsible for building businesses such as Tylenol, Motrin, Imodium and Splenda. Watts also had various marketing roles early in his career at both Johnson & Johnson and Nabisco. He received his B.A. from Brown Universityand his joint MBA/Masters of International Relations from the University of Pennsylvania.
"Colin comes to us at a very exciting time in North America as we accelerate the growth of our B2B/Healthcare business, starting with large, self-insured companies and leading to new partnerships with payers, providers and physicians that will significantly expand the reach and affordability of our services," said Burwick. "Colin's broad array of experiences and knowledge of the healthcare space and innovation development and commercialization make him uniquely qualified to transform our efforts in these critical areas."
Weight Watchers (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners is proud to announce Frank Ambrose as EVP Platform and Technology for Audax Health Solutions. Ambrose has 20 years of experience in technology infrastructure development, data architecture and operations. Ambrose joins Audax from Linden Lab as SVP Global Technology. He also held several consecutive executive roles at AOL, the world's largest Internet service provider, where he spent nine years developing network and infrastructure services. Previously Ambrose was a senior manager at MCI Telecommunications. He holds a bachelor's degree in Finance from Siena College in New York, and was commissioned as an officer in the US Navy, serving in both active duty and reserve capacities from 1985-1998. Audax Health Solutions' mission is to combine the power of social networking with provider-based clinical and plan-based benefit management information.
Audax (Corporate Website)
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Bryan Bennett joined Booyah, part of Kleiner Perkins’ iFund, in December of 2011 as Vice President of Marketing. Bryan leads all aspects of marketing, including customer acquisition, community management and product launches. He also is also charge with strategic initiatives around partnerships and channel development that combined with marketing will position the company to rapidly grow audience reach and revenue.
Bryan brings a wealth of experience in social gaming and community from Kabam, where he was previously General Manager for many of Kabam’s premiere games like Global Warfare, Glory of Rome and Epic Goal. Bryan was one of the first 30 employees that played a key executive role in transitioning the original company, Watercooler, in 2010 from an online publisher of fantasy sports applications to the social gaming platform, Kabam. Bryan’s DNA in content and community began with his early years at Piczo (acquired by Stardoll Entertainment) and Peerflix (acquired by LiveUniverse). He has also lead brand management for AOL’s Netscape Internet Service and Product Marketing for Covad Communications.
Bryan started his career with Verizon in marketing. He is a graduate of Texas Christian University and holds a BBA in Marketing from the University of Texas at Austin.
Booyah (Corporate Website)
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Mark joins Gaikai as Chief Operating Officer from Jesta Digital. As Chief Operating Office for Jesta, Mark was responsible for managing the company's product, marketing and technology operations for its global brands including Jamba, Jamster, and the groundbreaking Bitbop wireless television subscription service available currently in the U.S. and Germany. He also was one of the key executives who saw the transition of the business from Fox Mobile to Jesta Digital, a leading global provider of next generation entertainment products and services for the digital consumer.
Mark originally joined Fox Mobile in 2007 as the CFO of Jamba, a leading global digital entertainment company that was headquartered in Berlin, Germany, and helped lead the integration into Fox Mobile Group following NewsCorp’s acquisition of the company. Mark oversaw global finance, business strategy, merges and acquisitions, legal and human resource operations as Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President of Corporate Development for Fox Mobile.
Marc also served as Chief Financial Officer for Sony Digital Pictures, where he managed all aspects of finance and corporate development. Mark is a graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles.
Gaikai (Corporate Website)
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High-rolling e-commerce site Moda Operandi continues its hiring spree this week by tapping Ashley Bryan as its new chief marketing officer, effective immediately. Bryan was formerly the head of U.S. marketing and sales for Net-a-Porter, so she's well-experienced with international luxury web retail. She's also the sister of Lucky fashion editor Alexis Bryan Morgan and daughter of Anna Wintour's longtime boyfriend, communications executive Shelby Bryan. According to a press release from Moda Operandi, Bryan will report directly to the company's CEO, Aslaug Magnusdottir.
Moda Operandi (Corporate Website)
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Lee Clancy joined Trulia in November 2011 to lead consumer products, platform and mobile for the company. Lee Clancy was most recently the SVP of Product Management and General Manager of Direct Revenue for IMVU, an online community whose members use 3D avatars to meet new people, chat, create, and play with their friends. IMVU has reached 50 million registered users, 10 million monthly unique visitors and a $40 million revenue run rate.
Lee was previously at Yahoo!, where he was Senior Director for Community Products. At Yahoo!, Lee also led product management for Yahoo! Groups, a global community of 110 million users, and Yahoo! Personals, the most visited destination in the dating market. Prior to Yahoo!, Lee co-founded a music-focused social networking startup. Lee also worked at Broadband Office in business development and at PricewaterhouseCoopers in strategy consulting advising entertainment and media clients. Lee earned a B.A. in Spanish Literature from Amherst College, an M.B.A. from Cornell University, and an M.A. in International Relations from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.
Trulia (Corporate Website)
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VIP Art Fair, an online marketplace for art, has hired Lisa Kennedy as CEO. She comes from Amazon.com Inc. subsidiary company Quidsi Inc., where she had been executive vice president of e-commerce. Quidsi is parent to such online retailers as Diapers.com, No. 72 in the Top 500 Guide, and Soap.com. VIP Art Fair says that Kennedy, who had worked at Quidsi since 2007, helped increase its revenue tenfold before the company’s acquisition by Amazon nearly a year ago. VIP Art Fair launched in January 2011 and says it helps consumers connect with galleries to find and buy art. As CEO of the marketplace, Kennedy was hired by Carol Bell, Partner at Daversa Partners Executive Search.
“VIP Art Fair is poised for growth and I am excited to be part of it,” Kennedy says. “VIP Art Fair is a proven platform for galleries to interact with their clients in the digital space. I look forward to combining my passion for innovation with my experience building consumer-driven companies to grow VIP into a robust international brand.”
VIP Art Fair (Corporate Website)
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Sean comes to us with 20 years of experience including 10 years with leading Internet companies. Most recently, as VP of Finance at PayPal, he oversaw a quickly growing mobile business. He also served as Chief Accounting Officer and led the organization through periods of extraordinary top-line growth and expansion into international markets. Sean's other experience includes serving as CFO at eBay US category division and as head of finance for Amazon North America, where he was part of the management team that grew the business to over $4 billion in annual revenue. Sean started his career as an investment banker with Merrill Lynch where he helped raise over $500 million in equity and debt financing for Fortune 500 clients. During his downtime, Sean enjoys hiking, golf and tennis with his two sons and likes to discover new restaurants with his wife. Sean holds an M.B.A. from the Kellogg School of Management.
Trulia (Corporate Website)
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Callaway Digital Arts CEO, Rex Ishibashi's, entrepreneurial career reflects his passion for media, entertainment, and technology. Rex has held various roles at Electronic Arts during two tenures at the company, including leading Business & Corporate Development and co-founding EA.com in the late-90s, and as President of EA Japan. Rex was most recently CEO of Ohai, a next-gen social games company founded out of Sony Online Entertainment and EA. Rex was also part of the early executive teams atWIRED (acquired by CondeNast), Kontiki (acquired by VeriSign), Motricity Mobile (IPO in 2010), and the founder of Originator Media. Rex has advised a number of ventures including Elevation Partners, SecondLife, Chow/Chowhound (acquired by CBS Interactive), Matrix Memory (acquired by SanDisk), Blurb, and MOG.
Callaway Digital Arts (Corporate Website)
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Redwood City, CA – October 4, 2011 – Truaxis, the leading provider of data-driven personalized services like the innovative financial technology StatementRewards and the popular money-saving search engine BillShrink.com, announces today the appointment of Jen Millard as Chief Revenue Officer.Millard comes to Truaxis as a recognized retail industry expert on consumer and channel segmentation, specializing in the convergence of technology and retail innovation that improves operations and customer experience. In her new role, Millard will be responsible for leading the sales effort with national and local merchants and complementing the success that Casey Newton and his team have accomplished introducing the StatementRewards platform to the financial services market.“Retailers today need ways to identify and reward existing customers, as well as attract new ones,” said Jen Millard, Truaxis CRO. “A product like StatementRewards can give any retailer access to real purchase information, allowing them to radically improve the customer-retailer relationship. It’s an innovative new platform that allows all retailers to create a more personal and relevant customer relationship.”“This is an exciting time of growth for Truaxis. This past month our StatementRewards platform rolled out to more than 2,500 banks and 8 million customers across the country and the announcement of our new Purchase Insights additions to StatementRewards was very well received by the financial industry,” said Schwark Satyavolu, co-founder and CEO of Truaxis. “We are committed to building a platform that drives tremendous value to the retailers and FIs on the platform. Adding Jen to the team strengthens our retail expertise and is critical to delivering on our commitment to build the most effective customer development platform for retailers. We also gain a strategic thought leader in the retail space that can help with the massive growth and expansion in store for the coming year.”Millard has more than 20 years of experience as a retail operations executive. She has an extensive background that extends into working with brick-and-mortar retailers, e-commerce, vending and automated retail channels, and pop-up environments in both strategy and execution. Millard was the founder and managing partner of Retail Growth Partners LLC, a retail consulting practice focused on helping retailers and brands create long-term relationships with customers. Her practice centered upon innovations and technologies that improve the customer experience. Prior to RGP, Millard was the Executive Vice President of New Business Development for ZoomSystems, an automated retail start-up in San Francisco. Key clients included innovation projects for traditional brick-and-mortar clients such as Macy’s, Best Buy, Metro Ag, as well as distinguished brands in luxury, personal care and specialty apparel. Prior to ZoomSystems, Millard held executive positions at Bed Bath & Beyond, Brown Shoe Group, Sears, Saks Inc. and was a Director at McMillan Doolittle LLP, a boutique retail firm in Chicago. She serves on multiple retail and consumer products Board of Directors and holds a seat on the Board of Governors to the University of North Texas Retail Merchandising School. She is a member of the National Retail Federation, International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC), Airport Council international (ACI), and was recognized by Chain Store Age as a ”Rising Star – Top 40 under 40” in 2007.
Truaxis (Corporate Website)
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San Francisco, Calif. – adBrite® (www.adbrite.com), the largest independent ad exchange, today announced that digital ad sales veteran Rick Cotton has joined the company as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO). Rick has nearly two decades of experience driving advertising sales with premium media brands such as Monster, CBS and Lycos. His focus at adBrite will be to drive the adoption of Real-Time Pricing™ (RTP), a publisher solution that automatically optimizes the floor price for every page view on a publisher property on the web.
A seasoned Internet executive, Rick comes with a proven track record in general management, sales, business development, and online marketing. At Monster, he led consumer advertising sales while simultaneously serving as general manager for Fastweb.com, a division providing online services to help students pay for college. Other channels under his sales management umbrella included Military.com, Monster Communities and Education.org. Prior to Monster, he was the general sales manager for CBS Radio.
“Rick has the experience of driving the digital ad sales strategy at one of the most recognized brands on the Internet. By adding him to our team, we have bolstered adBrite’s position as the top independent ad exchange in the market.,” said Iggy Fanlo, CEO of adBrite. “Rick will play a key role in bringing adBrite’s RTP technology to the market to unlock true audience value and drive publisher monetization levels to new heights.”
For the past few years, the online advertising segment has grown through new technology and innovation for marketers and ad buyers. This has left publishers with a void where they are now relying on a new wave ofmonetization technology to lift revenue and yield. Rick is joining adBrite as it completes the development of RTP technology.
“adBrite understands the pain points of publishers and is rolling out high impact tools to meet their needs. Coming from an ad sales and publisher mindset, I am excited about adBrite’s technology as it far exceeds what others are developing,” said Rick Cotton, CRO. “The potential for RTP is immense and it is poised to cause disruption in how online advertising is bought and sold. I am eager to leverage my experience with the adBrite team as we roll out RTP to the market.”
adBrite’s advanced algorithms drive its Real-Time Pricing solution, which empowers publishers to calculate optimal floor prices usingrich data sets from a variety of categories, such as advertiser type, audience segment, geo- and demographic information, time-of-day and more. Real-Time Pricing will be available for wide adoption this year.
adBrite (Corporate Website)
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Loic Vienne has been announced as the new Vice President of Enterprise Systems for Weight Watchers. He has proven experience in delivering transformation programs and achieving business & IT strategies. Prior Loic has had 12 years of experience working for Global Fortune 500 companies, as well as “big-5” consulting firms. Carol Bell, Partner at Daversa Partners commented on his new role, “Loic has a unique combination of client and technical skills that he will contribute to this global role. He is an articulate technical spokesman who understands and relates to the business pressures and how technology can increase efficiency and support global business functions.”
Weight Watchers (Corporate Website)
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REDWOOD CITY, Calif.—Sep 8, 2011—oDesk, the largest and fastest-growing online employment platform, announced today that Jaleh Bisharat has joined the company as vice president of marketing. Bisharat, an internet marketing veteran, will spearhead marketing strategy and operations. She will also oversee product and brand marketing, communications, customer insight, lead generation and acquisition.
“Jaleh will help us take oDesk to the next level as the world leader in online employment,” said oDesk CEO Gary Swart. “Her broad range of experience fits perfectly with oDesk’s strategic marketing goals. With Jaleh on board, we will increase global awareness of online talent as a mainstream workforce solution.”
Bisharat brings more than twenty years of technology marketing experience to oDesk. She has been a marketing executive at six leading Internet companies, including OpenTable and Amazon.com. She is known for taking companies from their early stages and growing them to recognizable brands. Bisharat has received awards for her work, including an Advertising Age Marketing 100 Award. She has also been named a Power 50 Marketing Executive by Advertising Age. Bisharat earned her AB from Harvard and her MBA from Harvard Business School.
“oDesk’s explosive growth reflects a groundbreaking shift in the marketplace,” said Bisharat. “Online work removes geography as a barrier to opportunity. It gives businesses access to the very best talent anywhere, while empowering professionals with fulfilling and flexible employment. I’m excited to help oDesk pioneer this expansive way of doing business, and to uncover new avenues to fuel the company’s growth.”
oDesk has been growing aggressively since launching its online work marketplace and proprietary oDesk Team software in 2005, and consistently reports the business nearly doubling in size every year for the past five years. With more than 100,000 new job opportunities and over $20 million earned by contractors during August 2011 alone, oDesk is continuing its mission to change how the world works.
oDesk (Corporate Website)
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SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Big Fish Games, Inc. today announced that it has appointed David Stephenson as chief financial officer, following more than 20 years of senior financial and operational leadership at Amazon.com and Procter & Gamble.
“Dave’s experience, values and performance orientation make him an excellent cultural fit for Big Fish”Dave’s responsibilities at Big Fish include oversight of worldwide strategic and business planning and finance operations. “Dave’s experience, values and performance orientation make him an excellent cultural fit for Big Fish,” said Jeremy Lewis, Big Fish chief executive officer and president. “His demonstrated track record of leading operational finance teams focused on large and complex consumer markets aligns incredibly well with our business and our plans for extending our operations, brand and product offerings across multiple platforms and geographies.”
Dave joins Big Fish after eleven years at Amazon.com, most recently as vice president of finance for the company’s $15 billion North American Retail division, encompassing physical and digital merchandise, and financial oversight of subsidiaries including diapers.com and MyHabit.com. Earlier positions included vice president of finance for the Merchant Services division and finance director for Amazon Web Services. In addition to the core controllership responsibilities for these businesses, Dave played significant roles in the Mom and Student Prime subscription programs, launching the Marketplace business in China, and leading the pricing analysis for Amazon Web Services. Prior to Amazon, Dave spent nine years with Procter & Gamble, where he focused on global strategic planning and new business development within multiple P&G business lines.
“Big Fish has kept a low profile,” said Dave Stephenson, “and when I came to know the team and the business I was incredibly impressed, particularly with their culture and talent base, their obsessive focus on developers and customers, and their data-driven decision making and operational rigor. Big Fish is a great brand with terrific opportunities ahead and I’m thrilled to be part of the team.”
Big Fish Games (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces the placement of Jonathan Shapiro as CEO of PetcareRX. Before joining PetcareRX, Shapiro was CEO of MediaWhiz where he was responsible for guiding MediaWhiz's strategy and operational execution, including overseeing the integration of the company's suite of marketing services, leading the development of new and unique capabilities, and ensuring the organization can deliver better results for its performance marketing clients. Before joining MediaWhiz, Jonathan was President of Lillian Vernon Corp., where he was responsible for the management of the company and its subsidiaries. Lillian Vernon was sold to a group of investors in July of 2006. Previously, Jonathan was the Chief Strategy Officer of DoubleClick, where he was in charge of setting strategy and overseeing M&A. He began his tenure at DoubleClick as Vice President responsible for the company's Internet Advertising Network before being appointed Senior Vice President of the company's Abacus online division, where he created DoubleClick's data strategy and oversaw development of new online targeting products and services. Additionally, Jonathan was the executive responsible for developing United Media's original web businesses (The Dilbert Zone, Snoopy.com and Comics.com), and was a senior consultant with McKinsey & Co.
Based in Lynbrook, NY, PetCareRx.com is a leading national pet pharmacy that provides prescription and non-prescription pet medications, health and nutritional supplements and accessories directly to the pet owner at significant savings. In addition to cost savings, the Company also offers the pet owner the convenience of ordering online or by telephone and delivers the product to the customer’s home.
PetcareRX (Corporate Website)
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SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Grockit, a social learning company, today announced the hiring of Chris Henley, vice president of engineering, to lead the company’s engineering efforts and scale technology development as Grockit continues to grow and increase its product offerings. Chris will focus on product development across new platforms and new geographies. He will also work with partners to launch new co-branded products.
“We’re thrilled to have Chris on board,” says Roy Gilbert, Grockit CEO. “He is a gifted leader, skilled technologist, and his background in building social products that engage millions of users is a perfect fit for Grockit.”
Chris was most recently the VP of engineering at Roost where he led engineering and helped shape product operations. Prior to Roost, Chris served as the founding director of engineering and executive producer at Social Gaming Network, an early pioneer in social gaming. He helped grow the company from three people to more than one hundred in just over a year, while overseeing the technology and operations behind SGN’s Facebook and iPhone games that had a combined reach of over 50 million users.
Grockit (Corporate Website)
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Bonobos, a web-only premium clothing brand for men, just announced the hiring of Michael Hart, Netflix’s former Director of Engineering for social systems, as CTO. Hart says he wanted to “lead an earlier stage company” and was excited to apply what he learned at Netflix in terms of personalization and social networking.
Hart received a BS in Business Administration from Bowling Green State University and worked as a Product Unit Manager at Microsoft. He launched Netflix’s social integration and Netflix API during his time at that company.
Bonobos (Corporate Website)
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BOSTON, Sept. 6, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Gazelle (www.gazelle.com), the nation's leading consumer electronics reCommerce™ service, today announced that Sarah Welch has been named its Chief Marketing Officer (CMO). Sarah joins Gazelle as its first CMO and will be immediately responsible for the company's overall marketing strategy and award-winning product and Customer experience. In her role, Sarah will lead Gazelle's fast-growing marketing team, and bring leadership to the expansion of tactics, including advertising, online marketing, and communications. Sarah will report directly to co-founder and CEO, Israel Ganot.
Sarah joins Gazelle with more than 15 years of marketing experience. Sarah joins Gazelle from TripAdvisor, the world's most visited travel website, where she held senior roles including Vice President of Marketing and Vice President of the TripAdvisor Media Group. Before TripAdvisor, Sarah worked at an array of well-established companies including BabyCenter, the leading online resource for new and expectant parents, and eBay. Sarah earned her Bachelor's from Brown University and her MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
"Sarah's experience and approach make her a great fit for Gazelle's business and culture," said Israel Ganot, Co-Founder and CEO of Gazelle. "As CMO, Sarah will round out our executive team, and I'm confident that with her mix of experience and deep background in both marketing and product she will help us bring reCommerce to the masses."
"Gazelle is the perfect match for my experience and interests," said Sarah Welch. "Gazelle's mission to redefine the consumption of electronics, the company's massive global opportunity for its business and the company's commitment to being a leading workplace all combined to make it an irresistible opportunity.
"This announcement comes on the heels of Gazelle's recently announced series D financing of $22M, led by Craton Equity Partners. Gazelle, founded in 2006, has inspired more than 200,000 Customers to change their consumption habits and trade-in more than 600,000 used electronics to be reused or responsibly recycled.
Gazelle (Corporate Website)
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As CRO, Steve Rowe will help with further monetization of MyCityWay’s products and technology. We are very excited about our plans to aggressively grow revenue through tailored integration of global brands, platform licensing, mobile commerce, content distribution partnerships, and custom-built marketing programs. Steve will use his experience to help MyCityWay partner with both global brands and local advertisers to facilitate connecting them with a valuable, engaged mobile audience, including location-based capabilities, and high precision consumer targeting.
MyCityWay (Corporate Website)
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Eric Hartness, SVP, Marketing: Eric will lead Pinger’s marketing team on its mission to make calling and texting free. Eric joined Pinger from PlayFirst, where he led the social games business unit that launched Diner Dash on Facebook. Previously, he was Chief Marketing Officer for PlaySpan, which was acquired by Visa. Prior, Eric spent almost nine years with Electronic Arts, where he was most recently Vice President of Marketing for its Redwood Shores studio responsible for hit games such as Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, The Simpsons Game, and Dead Space. Eric received a BSBA from the University of Arkansas, Magna Cum Laude and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Pinger (Corporate Website)
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New York, NY—Carol Bell, Partner at Daversa Partners has placed the new Vice President of Engineering for Vook, Rob Guttman. Prior to joining Vook, Rob was CTO at Juju, which experienced 10X traffic growth under his leadership. As Vice President of Engineering at Daylife, an online news aggregation and publishing platform, Rob led a team that shipped four products, powering over seventy news and media publisher sites. At the IBM T. J. Watson Research Center, Rob led a worldwide R&D initiative arming IBM’s business consultants with modeling tools and methods. Rob co-founded Frictionless Commerce, a consumer online comparison shopping platform, based on software agent technologies he invented at MIT’s Media Laboratory — earning him a 2002 MIT Technology Review Top 100 Young Innovators Award (TR100). Prior to MIT, he developed natural language processing software at Motorola and participated in U.S. Army war games to demonstrate and harden Motorola’s battlefield intelligence technologies.
Rob received a MS in Media Arts and Sciences from MIT in and a BSE in Computer Engineering from the University of Michigan.
Vook (Corporate Website)
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PALO ALTO, CA--(Marketwire - Jul 25, 2011) - ShareThis Founder Tim Schigel today announced the appointment of Kurt Abrahamson as the company's new Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. ShareThis is the world's largest sharing marketplace, built for advertisers and publishers to tap into the economic value of sharing and influence across the Web. Abrahamson will be charged with scaling the ShareThis platform to become an industry standard by driving new economic value for the entire online economy of publishers, consumers and advertisers. Schigel will remain Chairman of the Board and will continue to participate in the daily operations of the business, working closely with Abrahamson as ShareThis enters this new phase of growth. "We chose Kurt not only because of his incredible reputation and stellar track record in growing companies in this space, but because he has the vision and experience to lead ShareThis as it transforms the economics of online advertising across the Web," said Schigel, ShareThis founder. "He brings both operational expertise and market vision that will be critical as we enter this pivotal stage in the company's growth." Abrahamson most recently served as CEO of SocialMedia.com, a leader in online display advertising, which was recently acquired by LivingSocial. Abrahamson came to SocialMedia.com from Google, where he first served as Director of the Content Media Group. In this position, he helped lead the global launch of Google AdSense, managed the direct sales channel for publishers, and secured long-term deals with five of the top 10 Web properties. Abrahamson also served as the Director of Global Sales & Operations Strategy and as Director of Sales Operations for North America. Prior to working at Google, he served as Chief Operating Officer of Jupiter Communications and as President of Jupiter Media Metrix, where he helped build their business from a small 12-person group to 520 employees worldwide, establishing Jupiter as one of the leading Internet research organizations. "Sharing is the Web's most explicit indicator of consumer influence and economic value of online content," said Abrahamson, CEO. "Yet brands and publishers are still searching for a way to understand and realize the potential of sharing in driving value for the entire economy of publishers, advertisers and consumers. ShareThis is arguably the only company in the world with the scale, depth and vision to transform the industry by taking advantage of this fundamental human behavior and delivering on the value of sharing. I couldn't be more excited at the opportunity to shape the strategic vision and execution of its next phase of growth."
ShareThis (Corporate Website)
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PALO ALTO, Calif., June 23, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- shopkick, the largest location-based shopping app, today announced Doug Galen has joined its C-Suite as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) to lead the expanding network of retail partnerships and revenue growth. Galen brings more than 20 years of experience in building successful alliances to support corporate planning and strategy, most recently as Senior Vice President, Business and Corporate Development at Shutterfly where he was part of the core leadership team that took the company public and grew the business from 100 to 1,000 people and from $50 million in revenue to close to $500 million.
"We have grown at an incredible rate, quickly building the only retailer coalition rewards program in America, with 10 nationwide strategic retail partners and 1.8M users. Now it's time to scale this retailer coalition to the next level, both in terms of the number of partner retailers and the revenue generated for our partners. Doug is the answer," said Cyriac Roeding, co-founder and CEO of shopkick. "I believe whole-heartedly in building the best team in the business, and Doug is it for the role we need at this stage in our explosive growth: he's grown companies by 10x in both team size and revenue. We look forward to him doing the same here."
"shopkick is a breakthrough company that presents the rare opportunity and challenge to change entire industries using new technologies, while unlocking massive value for both consumers and retailers at the same time. I see no other mobile player in the retail world that has the trajectory and power of shopkick," said Doug Galen, incoming Chief Revenue Officer of shopkick. "The caliber of existing retail and brand partners, the team, and shopkick's rate of expansion are matchless. I want to come in, help accelerate the pace further, and have a key role in this retail revolution."Galen joins shopkick from a high-profile role at Shutterfly where, as the Senior Vice President of Business & Corporate Development, he managed high growth initiatives, created over 50 partnerships, and led mergers and acquisitions, including the most recent acquisition of TinyPrints for $333M. Other prior roles include President of Fourth Fleet Financial, where he oversaw strategic corporate development; and Vice President & General Manager of New Ventures for eBay, where he was responsible for building and launching eight emerging business units including Tickets & Experiences and Real Estate.
Before eBay, Galen was Vice President of Sales and Business Development for E-LOAN where, as its third employee, he helped grow the company to $150 million in revenue resulting in a successful IPO. During his tenure at E-LOAN, Galen also developed more than 70 corporate alliances, joint ventures and acquisitions.
Galen is on the Board of Directors for the Positive Coaching Alliance and an Advisor for Prosper, Abe's Market, Adchemy, Glam Media, Centrro, Stub Hub and the New Paradigm Broadcast Network. He earned his MBA in Real Estate & Finance and BA in Economics from University of California, Berkeley.
shopkick (Corporate Website)
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Chicago, IL—Vibes Media, the industry leader in mobile marketing, today announced that John Haro has joined its executive team as Chief Technology Officer. Haro will be responsible for leading the IT and engineering teams focused on scaling and driving innovation around mobile marketing optimization and personalization.
Haro has a proven track record of success that he will bring to Vibes as they scale the team and its platform through extreme growth. Most recently, Haro was the Senior Vice President of Software Engineering at iCrossing. Prior to iCrossing, he was Vice President of Technology at Agency.com. Haro holds a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Northern Illinois University.
Vibes Media (Corporate Website)
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Long Island City, NY—Tabula Digita, an industry leader out to revolutionize K-12 education through its suite of educational video games, today announced that Ralph Seaman has joined its management team as Vice President of Technology. Seaman will be responsible for growing, leading, and managing the team that develops the social experience for the fastest-growing educational gaming company in the United States. He will also be responsible for outlining the strategic direction for technology infrastructure at the company. Seaman adds a breadth of experience and success to the executive team, most recently having held the position of Vice President of Technology at TheStreet.com. Prior to this, Seaman held director-level positions in technology at MTV Network and Agency.com. Seaman attended the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
Dimension U (Corporate Website)
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Long Island City, NY—Carol Bell, Partner at Daversa Partners has placed Michael Henson at Songza as their Chief Technology Officer. Michael brings an incredible user-centric skill set to Songza. He has established himself as a powerful technologist within the advertising and marketing space. Prior with Songza, Michael was with 24/7 Real Media as a technology manager. Prior, he was Director of Engineering at Did-It Search Marketing. Michael holds a Bachelor’s in Computer Science from RPI.
Songza (Corporate Website)
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Dan Sormaz recently joined Boxee as their Head of Design. Boxee is the creator of the Boxee Box and is a partially open-source freeware media player software platform that integrates personal locally stored media with Internet streaming media along with social networking features. Boxee’s social networking component allows users to share information about what they are watching or listening to with other Boxee users or friends on social networks like Twitter, Facebook, etc. In this new role, Sormaz will be responsible for designing the features of the Boxee software from user interface to user experience. Sormaz has an extensive background in creative space, having led the development of The Daily for News Corp and being the Art Director for GameDaily, a multimillion dollar company online media company that was acquired by AOL.
Boxee (Corporate Website)
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NEW YORK -- AdSafe Media, (www.adsafemedia.com), the rating standard for online media today appointed Scott Knoll as its new Chief Executive Officer. Knoll takes over management of the privately owned company during a time of rapid growth.
Knoll brings a solid combination of management experience, media sales, and technological savvy with a history of innovation to AdSafe Media.
AdSafe's co-founder Helene Monat, said, "AdSafe is at an important cross-road in its evolution and Scott joins at an exciting time to spearhead its next stage of rapid growth and expansion, especially into new products and digital platforms."
"AdSafe Media has a tremendous opportunity to innovate with technology that offers a unique and scalable approach to more effective advertising. It's an exciting time to join the company and help capitalize on the growth opportunities that exist," said Knoll.
"AdSafe is a company with tremendously knowledgeable and committed employees, with a unique culture and with many strong and exciting brands, agency, network and publisher partners. I am looking forward to helping AdSafe accelerate the recent trend of top brands choosing AdSafe's superior technology and solidifying AdSafe Media's position as the rating and verification standard in the online advertising industry," Knoll added.
Mr. Knoll most recently served as Founder and President of Aperture, a Datran Media company that provides audience targeting and measurement technology to blue chip brands, agencies and online publishers. Prior to joining Datran Media, Knoll, was CEO of BlackFoot, a digital advertising solutions company. He also spent 6 years as a senior executive at DoubleClick, directing the launch and development of the DoubleClick ad network in nine countries, including Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, China, Taiwan, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia and Korea.
Mr. Knoll also served as Managing Director of DoubleClick Asia Pacific and Vice President and General Manager of Global Marketer Solutions. Previously he co-founded and served as COO of Verified Person, and has held management roles at Time Warner Inc. and Andersen Consulting. Mr. Knoll holds an MBA degree from Harvard University and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Princeton University.
AdSafe Media (Corporate Website)
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Arnaud Collin joins Offermatic from eBay, where he was most recently Director of Marketing Strategy and Customer Lifetime Value. Arnaud’s eBay career spans over six years driving customer acquisition, user experience, segmentation, loyalty and product marketing for eBay’s Marketplace as well as eBay Belgium and eBay Australia. Before becoming one of eBay’s key marketing leaders, Arnaud was Director of Website Sales and Marketing for ViaMichelin, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Michelin Group that develops and markets digital travel assistance products and services for road users in Europe. Arnaud has also worked in management consulting for The Boston Consulting Group as well as product marketing and sales for L’Oréal and Unilever.
Offermatic (Corporate Website)
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Debra Chrapaty, senior vice president of Cisco's collaboration software group, was on Thursday named chief information officer at Zynga, a fast-rising San Francisco startup best known for games like FarmVille, CityVille and Mafia Wars that appear on social networking sites such as Facebook and as mobile device applications.
According to a statement sent to CRN by Zynga representatives, Chrapaty will report to Zynga CTO Cadir Lee, and will "play a key role in ensuring Zynga's tools and infrastructure are a key strategic advantage, enhancing Zynga's internal collaboration, and enhancing external tools that touch our players."
"Through its focus on leading technology, Zynga is redefining how we look at play," said Chrapaty in the statement. "My job will be to make it easier for our employees to design and build for play. I am looking forward to tackling Zynga's unique technology challenges and helping develop infrastructure systems to ensure that we have the most scalable, secure and reliable systems in place."
Lee described Chrapaty as a "technology visionary."
"Her experience with both rapidly growing companies as well as running some of the largest networks in the world will prove invaluable as Zynga continues to grow and develop games that delight our millions of players," Lee said.
Chrapaty joined Cisco in September 2009 following six years as a corporate vice president at Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT). At Cisco, she replaced Doug Dennerline in the top post of Cisco's collaboration group. She has also held executive roles with Organic, AllBusiness and ETrade technologies, and was also chief technology officer of the National Basketball Association.
Chrapaty's role in the collaboration group meant she oversaw some of Cisco's key UC and collaboration products, including the WebEx platform. Her group was also at the center of a recent Cisco misfire:the discontinuation of Cisco Mail, a hosted e-mail product first unveiled in late 2009 and which is said to have cost Cisco nearly $250 million in development.
"The product has been well-recieved, but we've since learned that customers have come to view their e-mail as a mature and commoditized tool versus a long-term differentiated element of their collaboration strategy," Chrapaty wrote in a blog post at the time.
Chrapaty's exit is the latest in a recent string of executive departures from Cisco. Among the big names that have left or announced their departure in the past six months are Tony Bates, now CEO of Skype, Susan Bostrom, Cisco's chief marketing officer, and, in the channel-facing executive team, Luanne Tierney, now at Cisco nemesis Juniper.
Zynga (Corporate Website)
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Mazen Rawashdeh has accepted the role of Vice President of Platform and Operations at Twitter. Prior to joining Twitter, Rawashdeh was responsible for the Ebay Marketplaces product and prior to that was Senior Director of Infrastructure and Engineering responsible for servers and data center operations. Prior to eBay Rawashdesh had held positions at Oracle, OPSWARE, and LoudCloud.
Twitter (Corporate Website)
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Online learning site Grockit is scaling up its leadership team after raising $7 million last May. Today it is announcing that it is hiring Roy Gilbert as CEO. Gilbert is Google’s director of user operations and policy, in charge of many non-advertising operations. He helped set up Google’s India operations and grew it from 20 people to 1,000, and was the first business manager for Gmail.
Founder Farb Nivi recruited Gilbert, who will also be taking a board seat. Nivi will be president, chief product officer, and chairman. “I kind of look at him as our Eric Schmidt,” says Nivi, who came back getting hit by a minivan last year to keep his startup going and growing.
Gilbert served in the military driving nuclear submarines, and yes, he was a boy scout. But he also comes from a family of teachers, and he and his wife started a school in Hyderabad while he was in India for underprivileged children called the Rainbow Primary School. So he has education chops as well. “I pretty much can’t believe we landed him,” says Nivi.
Nivi also recently hired a chief marketing officer, Chris Strausser, who created the Jamba Juice brand, and previously worked at PepsiCo and Kaplan. Knewton, another online education startup, also recently made a top executive hire. The whole education space is definitely heating up.
Grockit (Corporate Website)
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PALO ALTO, CA--(Marketwire - May 24, 2011) - ShareThis, the world's largest market for sharing and influence, today announced that it tops the list of distributed content media networks for the second month in a row with more than 176 million unique visitors, according to April 2011 comScore data. Additionally, ShareThis continued to increase its revenue and strengthen and expand its team with the addition of Barry Grant as the new VP of product, as well as increasing its sales footprint across the country."The continued growth of our publisher network and the increasing demand from advertisers reflects the ongoing massive shift on the Web toward sharing. The act of sharing content and encouraging conversation around it is at the center of a whole new era of how people interact online," said Tim Schigel, CEO of ShareThis. "Adding Barry to the team will help us open new doors in our products and offerings that help publishers and advertisers recognize that changing reality and use sharing to drive their businesses."Additional Early 2011 ShareThis highlights include:
According to April 2011 comScore data1, ShareThis reaches the fourth largest U.S. audience among advertising focused media properties with more monthly reach than Google, Facebook, AOL and YouTube;·
ShareThis is the largest distributed media content network with more than 176 million unique U.S. visitors, a larger audience than the other networks in comScore's top five combined;·
Staff has grown by 50 percent, reaching more than 50 employees this quarter;·
ShareThis continues to expand their sales teams, with the hire of Giorgio Campo, Regional Midwest Director, in Chicago and several recent additions to the New York sales team, rounding out its national coverage for the company;·
Revenue continues to grow each quarter, with 100 percent growth quarter over quarter.
Barry Grant comes to ShareThis from Brightroll where he led the product organization for the last three years, driving the development, launch and evolution of the Brightroll Exchange, their self-service online video advertising marketplace. Prior to his time at Brightroll, Barry spent two years at PayPal where he oversaw several risk management product programs, focusing on improving PayPal's consumer initiatives and the eBay buyer experience. Barry will bring his product development experience and expertise to ShareThis where he will play an instrumental role in the development of products to bring more value to advertisers, publishers and consumers.
"I see tremendous new opportunities in the world of social interactions. Online sharing is not just a distribution channel, it's an entire movement that's all about enhancing engagement," said Barry Grant, new VP of Product at ShareThis. "I'm thrilled to be joining ShareThis, a company that sees how important sharing is and uses it to provide valuable products to publishers, advertisers and consumers that help drive the larger Internet economy."
ShareThis (Corporate Website)
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SANTA MONICA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jirbo Inc., a leading social entertainment and media company at the forefront of iPhone development since 2007 and backed by Insight Venture Partners, announced today that marketing and interactive entertainment veteran Will Kassoy has been named Chief Executive Officer.
“As the mobile and social games markets continue to explode, I’m eager to jump in and take on this new challenge”In this role, Kassoy will oversee Jirbo, Inc's operational management including their app gaming division, Jirbo, which has over 32 million downloads including 48 titles breaking in to the top 1% of Apple’s All Time Most Popular list. His responsibilities also include overseeing the recently-launched premium advertising network called AdColony. AdColony delivers high definition video ads to millions of app consumers, including the industry’s first Video-for-Virtual-Currency SDK, which offers a brand new way for app publishers to monetize social games. He will assume this position from founder, Jonathan Zweig who will become President of Jirbo, Inc.
Kassoy joins Jirbo, Inc. from Activision Blizzard, the world's largest video game publisher, where he served a number of Senior Vice President roles including Strategic Growth and Head of Global Brand Management. In these roles Mr. Kassoy was responsible for leading Activision’s global marketing, media research, marketing communications, business development and setting long term business goals for emerging platforms. During his 13 years with Activision Blizzard, Kassoy was responsible for guiding some of the largest entertainment properties in history including Call of Duty, Tony Hawk, Marvel and Guitar Hero.
"Will brings his extensive experience from Activision Blizzard to the CEO position at Jirbo and will be invaluable in growing both our app development and AdColony business units," said Jonathan Zweig, President of Jirbo Inc. “We’re confident that his skill set is exactly what we need to assume leadership in this thriving new market.”
"As the mobile and social games markets continue to explode, I’m eager to jump in and take on this new challenge,” said Will Kassoy. “AdColony’s innovative premium mobile ad technology will be a tremendous advantage for both advertisers and app publishers and I’m confident we can turn it into the new gold standard for generating revenue in mobile social gaming.”
Jirbo (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners is pleased to announce Anna Punsal as the new Vice President of Customer Relationship Management for Art.com, the world’s largest selection of art and décor items for homes and businesses. Most recently, Anna served as the Vice President, Customer Relationship Management at eMusic, the world’s largest retailer of independent music and the world’s second-largest digital music service after iTunes. Ms. Punsal focused on effectively building customer engagement through loyalty and retention marketing programs. She joined eMusic with more than 15 years of marketing experience with Fortune 500 companies and Internet start-ups such as EarthLink and Yahoo! where she developed strong expertise in the design and execution of multi-channel retention and loyalty programs that enhance the customer experience and result in higher customer lifetime value. Previous to eMusic, Ms. Punsal served as Director of Customer Retention and Loyalty at EarthLink where she created a customer experience that contributed to PeoplePC becoming the fastest growing dial-up provider and winner of the 2006 J.D. Power and Associates Customer Satisfaction award. At Yahoo!, Punsal drove measurable growth in the awareness and usage of Yahoo! products and services.
Art.com (Corporate Website)
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Beth Birnbaum joins GrubHub after spending 8 years at in product at Expedia. Most recently she was the VP of Connectivity and Product Management responsible for commercial relationships as well as product management for air, car and destination services. With over 13,000 delivery and pickup restaurants, GrubHub helps you find and order food wherever you are. How it works: you type in an address, we tell you the restaurants that deliver to that locale as well as showing you droves of pickup restaurants near you. Want to be more specific? Search by cuisine, restaurant name or menu item. We'll filter your results accordingly. When you find what you're looking for, you can place your order online or by phone, free of charge. Oh, and we also give you access to reviews, coupons, special deals and a 24/7 customer service team that tracks each order and makes sure you get exactly what you want.
GrubHub (Corporate Website)
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John brings 20 years of executive leadership experience with proven ability to develop and scale technology-driven businesses to profitable growth. Most recently, John served as COO/CFO of ServiceMagic where he managed long-term strategy, investment planning, resource allocation, operational efficiencies, and financial performance across all operating divisions. Prior to ServiceMagic, John served as Senior Vice President of AOL Search, Local & MapQuest, building a $700 million global online portfolio and the fastest-growing and most profitable business unit in the company. His responsibilities included management of the Google strategic partnership which generated over $3 Billion during his tenure. His past experience includes developing successful customer strategy and business solutions for leading companies like ExxonMobil, Liberty Global, Harvard Business School Publishing, and HBO.
Kannapell has been a featured industry speaker at interactive media and venture capital, and online marketing conferences. He earned a BS in Business Administration from Washington and Lee University and an MBA from the F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business at Babson College where he graduated Magna Cum Laude.
2tor (Corporate Website)
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Jason Willig, a veteran of the video game industry, was most recently Chief Operating Officer at Electronic Arts, where he oversaw operating activities and online initiatives, including Littlest Pet Shop Online, for EA’s Hasbro business unit. Prior to joining Electronic Arts, Willig held senior positions at leading games companies including LucasArts, Vivendi Games & Gas Powered Games as well as founded a boutique online games developer and publisher, Big Top Games. Jason is a member of the International Game Developers Association & the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences. He has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Massachusetts.
Booyah (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners is pleased to announce Meagan Kirkpatrick as the new Director of Public Relations and Social Media for Shutterstock, the largest subscription-based stock photo agency in the world. Most recently, Ms. Kirkpatrick held the position of Director of Marketing for Mindspark where she spearheaded brand and market development. Prior to Mindspark, she served as Marketing Director for Brides.com and Brides Local Magazine,a division of Conde Nast Publications. Ms. Kirkpatrick was responsible for brand strategy and public relations and she was also recognized as 2006 “Condé Nast Marketer of the Year” for Brides.com. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Communications and Media Studies with a Minor in Business from Fordham University.
Shutterstock (Corporate Website)
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Songbird has announced Les Schmidt as CEO. Before joining Songbird, Less was senior vice president and general manager of cross company initiatives at Macromedia. In this role, Schmidt and his team lead efforts focused on optimizing the process of buying, using, and owning a Macromedia product as well as delivering great experiences on mobile devices. Schmidt joined Macromedia in 2003 to lead the redesign of the macromedia.com website to coincide with the launch of the MX 2004 products and introduced the Synchronous Development process to Macromedia. Prior to joining Macromedia, Schmidt held CEO, COO and CFO roles at various technology companies including Quokka Sports, MECON, Inc., The Learning Company and Applied Immune Sciences. His only hiatus from the high-tech world was to serve as chief operating officer for the San Francisco 49ers during the 2001 and 2002 seasons. Schmidt has a degree in political science and economics from Antioch College and a master’s degree in taxation from Golden Gate University. Headquartered in San Francisco, Songbird was founded in 2006 with the vision of delivering a free and open media player for people to find new music, listen to old favorites and experience a deeper connection to the music they love. Today, Songbird is also available on a variety of portable media players and smart phones, so people can enjoy their media on the go. Songbird is built by a group of designers and developers that have previously worked on Winamp, Netscape Navigator, and Mozilla Firefox. Thousands of developers passionate about music, media, and open source platforms have contributed to Songbird by writing code and creating new features that bring the best of the open media web to the newest generation of smart phones and media players.
Songbird (Corporate Website)
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NASHVILLE and CHICAGO– February 1, 2011 – edo Interactive, Inc., a pioneer in digital and mobile advertising, today announced the appointment of Mark Marinacci as Chief Revenue Officer. Marinacci will be responsible for driving edo’s advertising sales strategy.
“Mark is a strong addition to our executive team, and his experience will be instrumental as we move to the next phase of edo’s growth,” said edo CEO Ed Braswell. “His solid track record of advertising sales and his experience building partnerships with national merchants will continue to shape edo’s position as a market leader in digital advertising.”
By leveraging pre-existing global payment and mobile networks, edo’s patent-pending performance marketing platform enables brand advertisers to drive targeted and measurable content and offers to consumers. This new model of digital incentives known as Prewards® motivates desired purchase behavior for brand advertisers and delivers real savings to consumers.
“When I saw the value of edo’s solutions to advertisers I was immediately impressed,” said newly appointed CRO, Mark Marinacci. “During my eight years at Google, I worked closely with top brands to help them understand how data and consumer insight could help them engage end users. I look forward to continuing this at edo and pushing it further, helping marketers bridge the gap between online insight and purchase behavior at POS. I am excited to have brands understand the full value of edo’s advertising solutions including real time analytics for both online and in-store customers and being able to touch customers through multi-channel communication methods. Edo’s marketing platform will revolutionize digital advertising and I am excited to once again be on the forefront of groundbreaking technology.”
Prior to joining edo Interactive, Marinacci was with Google where he was most recently the Head of Retail Industry, working across both client and agency partners to serve Google's largest retail brands. Prior to that he was the Team Manager for Business and Industrial Markets. In this role Marinacci helped Fortune 500 brands understand Google’s platform and apply Google tools to solve communication and marketing challenges. Before joining Google, Mark was with HotJobs, a YahooCompany, where he held various roles in the sales organization.
About edo Interactive, Inc.
edo Interactive is a leader in digital and mobile advertising solutions, leveraging everyday payment networks to connect brands with consumers. edo’s comprehensive marketing platform employs advanced analytics and loyalty solutions to create value for consumers, brand advertisers and financial institutions. For more information, please visit www.edointeractive.com.
edo Interactive (Corporate Website)
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Jim Chou brings to Shutterstock over 20 years of leadership and technology experience in delivering innovative products. Most recently, he served as CTO & SVP for American Greetings Interactive. Jim has held senior technology positions with JP Morgan Chase, Accenture, Citidon, Antenna Software and Apani Networks. Jim is a graduate from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University and holds a BS in Electrical Engineering from The State University of New York at Buffalo.
Shutterstock (Corporate Website)
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Online jewelry retailer Ice.com announces the addition of Jason Ordway to the executive team. Ordway leads the technology vision, strategy and execution for Ice.com. Most recently Mr. Ordway served as the CTO of SureSource, LLC where he lead the Development, IT/OPs, Quality Assurance and Project Management teams in support of their direct to consumer ecommerce (including mobile) model for clients such as Budweiser, Coca-Cola, Casio, Hershey’s, and Crayola. Mr. Ordway also served as the CIO of RedRoller Holdings, Inc. where he lead the development and support of a subscription based online shipping application. Mr. Ordway has held senior technology positions in the .com world for both international and domestic companies such as Weightwatchers International, Outpost.com, CNN Financial News and Y&R New York. Ice.com is one of the largest and most respected online jewelry stores and was recently voted a Top 50 Retailer by Internet Retailer. They are backed by Polaris Ventures and Ignition Partners.
Ice.com (Corporate Website)
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Dulles, VA – January 27, 2011 – He will be based in the company's Dulles office reporting to Alex Gounares, AOL's Chief Technology Officer. As part of the global technology leadership team, Manos will support the development of advances in operations and data center technologies for the company.
"Michael brings a wealth of valuable experience and expertise to the team," said Alex Gounares, AOL Chief Technology Officer. "We are thrilled to have this highly sought after candidate on board as we continue to focus on developing best in class platform technologies that enable us to deliver excellent experiences to all of our users."
Michael Manos comes to AOL with over 17 years of experience in data center management, information technology platforms and large scale operations at leading companies around the country. Most recently, he was a vice president at Nokia where he was responsible for the global operations, consolidation and re-structuring of service operations for commercial-facing products and services. Prior to Nokia, Michael was a senior vice president for technical services at Digital Realty Trust where he oversaw the design, engineering, construction, and long term operation for the company's data center operations. He also held leadership positions at Microsoft, Walt Disney and Nuclio Corporation.
"I am excited to join AOL, especially now as the company is refocusing on providing its users with the best possible experience online and that starts with building a world class technology team to support all of the great work begin done by AOL's product teams," said Michael Manos. "Working with the global technology leadership team, I look forward to advancing the technological innovation across the AOL network."
AOL (Corporate Website)
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New York, NY, October 8, 2010 – AOL Inc. (NYSE: AOL) today announced the appointment of two new executives to its leadership team. Kathy Andreasen will join the company as Chief People Officer, effective October 25, 2010.
\"We are thrilled to welcome Kathy as a member of our senior executive team,\" said Artie Minson, AOL\'s Chief Financial and Administrative Officer.
Kathy Andreasen, who brings more than 15 years\' experience in the field of human resources, will oversee global people strategy, organization and leadership development and compensation and benefits. Andreasen will also be responsible for AOL\'s real estate and facilities management.
Andreasen joins AOL from Orchard Brands, a leading multi-channel marketer of apparel and home products where she was Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer. Prior to Orchard, Andreasen led HR for Bill Me Later, a subsidiary of eBay, and Orbitz Worldwide Inc. In addition, she has held a number of human resources leadership roles at Cendant Corporation as well as leadership roles in human resources and operations at NBCi. A graduate of McGill University, Andreasen also has an Executive MBA from the University of New Mexico.
AOL (Corporate Website)
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Tatum Lade recently joined Boxee as their Vice President of Engineering and R&D. Boxee is the creator of the Boxee Box and is a partially open-source freeware media player software platform that integrates personal locally stored media with Internet streaming media along with social networking features. Boxee’s social networking component allows users to share information about what they are watching or listening to with other Boxee users or friends on social networks like Twitter, Facebook, etc. In this new role, Lade will be responsible for all of the software engineering efforts for the organization. Lade has an extensive background in the online media/content space having been the founder and CTO of HD Cloud and Diversion Media and the Vice President of Technology at iFilm, Corp.
Boxee (Corporate Website)
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CHICAGO, Dec 20, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Groupon (http://www.groupon.com) is pleased to announce that Jason Child has joined the company as Chief Financial Officer.
Child brings nearly two decades of finance experience to the role. Most recently, he was Vice President of Finance for Amazon.com\'s $14 billion International business. Previously, Jason held key finance leadership roles for Amazon in Germany and Japan, also serving in Investor Relations, Technology, Marketing and as Worldwide Corporate Controller. Prior to Jason\'s nearly 12 years at Amazon, he spent more than seven years at Arthur Andersen where he was a CPA and Consulting Manager.
\"Groupon is one of the most amazing businesses I have ever seen,\" said Child. \"I am thrilled to join a great team that is attacking one of the biggest opportunities in e-commerce today.\" Child received a Bachelor of Arts in finance with an accounting concentration from University of Washington. He and his family have relocated from Seattle to Chicago.
Groupon (Corporate Website)
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Esther Lem joins Chegg.com, an online textbook rental company, as Chief Marketing Officer. Born in Canada, Ms. Lem came to Unilever in 1998 from account management for WPP Group\'s Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, Toronto, then brand management with the former Warner-Lambert Co. in Canada. Once at Unilever, she began overseeing a wide range of home- and personal-care brands in Canada.
Ms. Lem in 2000 came to the U.S., where she and other Unilever marketing executives have been focused squarely on the young male psyche as they prepare for the company\'s biggest personal-care launch of any kind since the 1997 debut of the Thermasilk hair care brand, which topped $100 million in sales in its first year. As vice president for brand development for antiperspirants and deodorants for Unilever in North America from 2002 until June of 2005, Esther lead the large challenge of marketing Axe, Degree, Suave Naturals and Dove products to overtake Procter & Gamble products like Old Spice in the U.S. Ms. Lem then went on to become Vice President North American Hair Care for Unilever, another area where Unilever has struggled in recent years, to lead brand development and to launch the debut of Sunsilk.
Chegg.com (Corporate Website)
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Kristen Fergason joined ShareThis as Chief Marketing Officer in December of 2010 from Yahoo! where the lead Industry Outreach. She joined Yahoo! through its acquisition of Maven Networks. As the Vice President of Marketing at Maven Networks, Kristen was responsible for all marketing efforts including product marketing, public relations, brand vision, marketing strategy, and market development. Before Maven, she served as the Vice President of Marketing for Major League Baseball Advanced Media for six years leading strategy for marketing operations for CRM, ad serving and email marketing as well as for MLB brands and its other partner properties. Previously she worked for outpost.com
ShareThis (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces the placement of Neil Markey as Chief Technology Officer at PlayFirst in San Francisco. He will have report directly to CEO Mari Baker.
Before joining PlayFirst, Market was Vice President of Engineering, at CafePress with responsibility for the customer-facing website and all of the company’s internal systems. Markey joined CafePress from Hewlett-Packard, where he led the Engineering organization for the hpshopping.com website. Markey has a Bachelor's degree from the U.K.'s Staffordshire University.
PlayFirst (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces that Annette Promes will be joining Big Fish Games as their VP of Marketing. Promes experience encompasses customer-base relationship and lifecycle marketing, email marketing, direct/database Marketing, product development and marketing, and marketing management. As senior direct of worldwide database marketing, Annette is responsible for all aspects of the database marketing channel at Expedia. Prior to this, Annette was in charge of developing and executing Expedia’s customer-centric email marketing program. Annette joined Expedia in 2006 from MSN. She has also lead marketing for Cingular Wireless and various marketing consulting firms in the Seattle area. She holds a MBA from the University of Phoenix.
Big Fish Games (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners is pleased to announce Randy Schmidt as the new VP of Internet Marketing at Direct Brands, the largest direct-to-consumer distributor of media products in the United States and Canada. Most recently, Mr. Schmidt was Director of CRM with Lord & Taylor where he was responsible for driving strategy and executing on customer relationship management, email and business intelligence initiatives. Prior to Lord & Taylor, he served as a business intelligence lead at May Department Stores. He holds a BS in MIS from Southern Illinois University.
Direct Brands (Corporate Website)
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Redwood City, Calif., (December 8, 2010) — Turn Inc., the industry’s only end-to-end platform for managing data-driven digital advertising, today announced that Tim Mahlman, former Vice President of Network Sales at Yahoo!, has joined Turn as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO). Mahlman also served as US VP of Sales at 24/7 and SVP of Sales for 24/7, APAC.
“Tim brings fifteen years of digital marketing experience and expertise to Turn. I’ve been impressed with his ability to lead and adapt to a rapidly changing marketplace while operating digital media organizations in the US, Europe and Asia,” said Bill Demas, CEO and President at Turn. “Tim’s deep client focus and proven success in working with large scale agencies and Fortune 500 brands makes him an asset to Turn’s growing team.”
As CRO, Tim is responsible for developing strategic relationships across the industry to drive the adoption of Turn’s platform solutions. In his new role, Mahlman will lead Turn’s sales, business development and client services divisions globally, while serving current clients and working with them on innovative solutions that address industry challenges.
“I’ve been watching Turn for several years and continue to see the company innovate,” said Tim Mahlman, Chief Revenue Officer at Turn. “There’s a tremendous amount of potential for audience targeting that sits between remnant and premium inventory and I’m excited to find creative ways to bring it to Turn’s brand and agency customers worldwide.”
Mahlman joined Yahoo! through its acquisition of BlueLithium in 2007. During his tenure, Tim delivered on innovative audience buying strategies for Fortune 100 brands, which produced best in class efficiency for their marketing spend. He also guided Yahoo! in growing its non-guaranteed inventory by 3x, showing the strongest growth in recent company history. Prior to Yahoo!, Tim was Chief Operating Officer of Winstar Interactive, an online representation company and served as Director of Sales at CLIQNOW before they were acquired by 24/7 in 1998.
Mahlman holds a BA in Communications from San Diego State University and is based out of Turn’s Headquarters in Silicon Valley, California.
For more information, visit www.turn.com.
Turn (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces that Andrew Nibley will be joining Yieldex as their CEO. Andy was prior Chairman, Advertising/Creative, for Burson-Marsteller, which specializes in business-to-business and corporate image advertising for such clients as Coca-Cola, Accenture and the U.S. government. Prior to that, he was President and CEO of GetMusic and Rollingstone.com, a part of Vivendi Universal's U.S. based Internet and technology company. Prior to GetMusic, he co-founded Reuters NewMedia Inc. Under his leadership, Reuters became the number one provider of news on the Internet, serving over 225 Web sites globally that generated 14 million unique visitors a month. From 1989 to 1994, he was Editor for North and Latin America for Reuters America Inc. Earlier, he served as News Editor, Europe, Middle East and Africa, based in London; News Editor North America, based in New York; and News Editor Washington. Prior to that, he covered four U.S. presidents and worked at United Press International and the Washington Star as well as Reuters. Andy also sits on the Boards of Sportsline USA Inc.; Oddcast LLC; and Newstruck Media, Inc.
Yieldex (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners is pleased to announce Philip Charles-Pierre as the new VP of Internet Marketing at Direct Brands, the largest direct-to-consumer distributor of media products in the United States and Canada. Mr. Charles-Pierre has a combined 10 years of business strategy and online marketing focused primarily on building and growing new businesses across the online travel and media space. Most recently, he served as Vice President for Digital Media at Guideposts Publishing, where he is responsible for the strategy, implementation and overall P&L of Guideposts’ digital initiatives. Previously, Philip worked at Starwood Hotels and Resorts, where he was responsible for its award-winning Loyalty programs. Prior to Starwood, Philip was an executive at Travelocity, where he managed the Travelocity Partner NetworkSM and was responsible for the P&L of the group and Travelocity’s overall white-label/strategic partnerships business. He holds a B.A. in philosophy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a Masters in Philosophy of Religion from Harvard University.
Direct Brands (Corporate Website)
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Gilt Groupe recently brought on Brian Dhatt as Vice President of Engineering for Gilt City. A veteran of both e-commerce and media, Brian previously served as chief technology officer at Sugar, a network of websites for women. He also spent time as the chief architect of BestBuy.com. In his new role, Dhatt will be in charge of running all technology efforts for Gilt City, globally. Gilt City is available in six US areas, including San Francisco and Chicago and recently launched in Tokyo. Dhatt is a graduate of Duke University.
The Gilt Groupe (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners is pleased to announce Steve Wilcox as the new Chief Marketing Officer at Direct Brands, the largest direct-to-consumer distributor of media products in the United States and Canada. He will report directly to Deborah Fine, the firm’s CEO. Mr. Wilcox brings a wealth of experience in the direct marketing world with proven results across acquisition, retention, loyalty, club and digital. He joins Direct Brands from MRM Worlddwide and has also held senior executive positions with Tequila NY, Publicis and Wunderman. He has worked with top tier clients to include Home Depot, Sprint, Walt Disney, Intuit and Sony. Mr. Wilcox holds a B.S. degree in Marketing and Communications from Arizona State University.
Direct Brands (Corporate Website)
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New York, NY – November 3, 2010 – AOL Inc. (NYSE: AOL) today announced the appointment of Curtis Brown to the company's Technologies team. Brown will join the company as Senior Vice President of Engineering for AOL Media, effective November 29, 2010. Both Brown will report to AOL Chief Technology Officer Alex Gounares and will serve in leadership roles on the company's Global Technology Cabinet.
"AOL was founded on the idea that great engineering is behind great consumer experiences," said Gounares. "[Curtis is] just the kind of world-class engineer we want to be known for -- proven leaders and innovators in the technology industry."
Brown, who has more than 15 years of experience in the technology field, will oversee the software development of AOL's broad-scale media platforms and will be responsible for the technology roadmap for AOL Media.
He joins AOL from leading educational services provider Kaplan Test Prep, where he was Chief Technology Officer. Prior to that, he served as CTO at CTB/McGraw-Hill, The Princeton Review, Oxygen Media and Skymall. He began his technology career with CDNow, where he was part of the team that built and launched one of the first music e-commerce sites. Brown is a graduate of New York University.
AOL (Corporate Website)
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His successes as an entrepreneur, investor, and board member speak for themselves.
November 18, 2010 MocoSpace, the largest entertainment destination on the mobile Internet, today announces the appointment of digital gaming and entertainment pioneer Mark Jung to its Board of Directors. Jung currently also serves as Chairman of the Board of Songbird and Playhaven, and is a member of the Board of Directors of Vitacost.Jung also served on the board of 3PAR until its recent acquisition by Hewlett-Packard for $2.4 billion. It's a great honor to have a person of Mark's experience and expertise join our board said MocoSpace CEO and co-founder Justin Siegel. His successes as an entrepreneur, investor, and board member speak for themselves. I look forward to working closely with Mark and the rest of the board to further MocoSpace's growth. Mark Jung has spent the last 20 years as a successful Internet CEO and entrepreneur. Most recently, Jung served as CEO at Vudu, a leading provider of digital home entertainment and interactive television services that was acquired by Walmart earlier this year. Prior to that, he was the Chief Operating Officer of Fox Interactive Media where he was responsible for the day-to-day operations of all of its properties including MySpace, IGN Entertainment, FoxSports.com, Scout Media, and AmericanIdol.com. Before Fox Interactive Media, Mark was co-founder and CEO of IGN Entertainment, a leading Internet media and services company for video games and other forms of digital entertainment, that was acquired by NewsCorp for $650 million in 2005. Mark was previously co-founder and CEO of Worldtalk Corporation, an Internet security company that he took public in 1996. Jung is also a member of the Management Board of the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the Leadership Council of the Princeton University School of Engineering and Applied Science...MocoSpace is incredibly well-positioned in the market today, serving a multicultural audience at the intersection of mobile, social, and entertainment, said Jung. The company is experiencing tremendous growth, has achieved profitability, and is poised to capitalize on strong trends in mobile browser-based gaming. In addition to Jung, MocoSpace's board of directors consists of company co-founders Justin Siegel and Jamie Hall, John Simon and Brad Hoover of General Catalyst Partners, and Ron Fisher of Softbank Capital. About MocoSpace MocoSpace is the largest entertainment destination on the mobile Internet, with over 15 million registered users generating more than 3 billion pages per month. For a young, multicultural, on-the-go generation, MocoSpace is the mobile community of choice for making friends, having fun and staying connected. MocoSpace is free and available on any web-enabled mobile phone in the world.
Launched in 2005, MocoSpace is based in Boston, MA and is backed by General Catalyst and Softbank Capital.
Mocospace (Corporate Website)
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London, UK – 17 November 2010 Shazam®, the world’s leading mobile discovery provider, announces today that it has appointed Evan Krauss as EVP, Advertising Sales.
Krauss joins Shazam from JumpTap Inc where he was SVP Global Ad Sales & Business Development. Previously, Evan spent six and a half years at Yahoo! where his last role was as Managing Director of Yahoo!’s Connected Life Business unit.
“Evan joins Shazam at a pivotal time,” says Andrew Fisher, CEO, Shazam. “Marketers and brands around the globe are waking up to the power of Shazam as a consumer channel which can engage customers in a unique and interactive way. Evan’s experience in fast-growth digital companies, creating and implementing innovative advertising solutions and driving revenue, combined with his skills at managing and motivating teams to succeed will prove a powerful combination for both Shazam and our media clients.”
“I couldn’t be more excited about joining Shazam at a time when it is rapidly expanding its proposition to media clients,” says Evan Krauss, Executive Vice-President, Advertising Sales, Shazam. “Whilst shazaming a song is already established behaviour for millions of people, now, marketers are also realising that they can deliver tailored, measurable marketing campaigns into people’s hands with the ability to Shazam television programming, radio shows and commercials.
“Shazam’s creation and leadership of this important new marketing category and ability to continually innovate to appeal to a growing number of consumers and marketers makes this an incredible opportunity,” continues Krauss.
Shazam has been used by more than 75 million people worldwide, including more than 20 million users on the iPhone and iPod touch worldwide and is now adding more than one million new users every week.
With 15 years experience in Internet, mobile and digital media, Krauss has built from scratch and managed some of the earliest and most successful Internet advertising teams at Excite, AOL, Looksmart and Yahoo! He has been directly responsible for hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue and forging new Internet advertising products and models since 1995. Prior to his role at JumpTap, Krauss was President, CEO of online video editing service, Cuts.
Shazam Entertainment (Corporate Website)
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Rob Singer joined Ancestry.com in November of 2010 as Vice President, Customer Relationship Management. Prior to Ancestry.com, Rob served as Senior Vice President of Customer Relationship Management for Bank of the West, where he managed the development of information management, enterprise reporting, advanced analytics and campaign management infrastructures as well as all direct response marketing channels.
Rob led customer intelligence, business intelligence and relationship marketing for StubHub for three years before joining Bank of the West. His career also spans database marketing and data mining for YellowBrick Solutions, Charles Schwab and KnowledgeBase Marketing and co-founding of Triporama, a customer-centric online travel service. A graduate of James Madison University, Rob holds a Bachelor of Science in Math.
Ancestry.com (Corporate Website)
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Gary Kovacs is the CEO of Mozilla Corporation with the responsibility for leading the overall direction of the organization and the Firefox Web browser.
Prior to joining Mozilla, Gary held senior leadership roles as Senior VP of Markets, Solutions & Products at Sybase (through its acquisition by SAP earlier this year), as General Manager and VP of Mobile & Devices at Adobe and as VP of Product Marketing at Macromedia (through its acquisition by Adobe).
Previously, he led the successful creation and growth of Zi Corporation, a company specializing in embedded software and services for mobile and consumer devices.
Prior to Zi Corporation, Gary spent 10 years at IBM in leadership positions in product management, sales, marketing and operations within the global software division.
He holds a bachelor of commerce and an MBA with distinction, from the University of Calgary.
Mozilla (Corporate Website)
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TheLadders.com, the world's leading community for $100K+ job seekers and $100K+ jobs, today announced the appointments of Nicholas Karrat as Vice President, Consumer Marketing. Karrat will lead consumer-facing marketing and advertising in support of TheLadders brand. Karrat will report directly to Alex Douzet, President and co-founder of TheLadders.com. Karrat joins TheLadders.com from LexisNexis where as Senior Director of Marketing & Alliances he was responsible for branding, marketing and analytics of their consumer flagship Lawyers.com. In this capacity, Karrat led both strategy and execution for television advertising, search engine marketing, web analytics and strategic alliances. Prior to LexisNexis, Karrat was Vice President of Internet Marketing at Citigroup with accountability for the Citi-American Airlines portfolio. He previously held various marketing and advertising positions in both Youth and Affluent segments at Citigroup. Before joining Citigroup, Karrat held management positions at Juno Online and AT&T within their Partnership Marketing and Database Architecture groups. Karrat holds an MBA in Marketing from Rutgers University and has received numerous recognitions including Citigroup's Chairman Award and Reed Elsevier's Innovation Honor Roll.
The Ladders (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners has placed Aaron Peterson as the Senior Director of Integrated Marketing at Tree.com, a leading marketplace providing consumers access to business and professionals when searching for financial products and real estate. Aaron joined the company in October of 2010 and is charged with leading internet marketing. Prior to joining LendingTree.com Aaron was the VP of Marketing at Hometownquotes.com. Aaron began his career at Netquote. At Netquote he developed and implemented several of the largest marketing programs in Netquotes history.
LendingTree.com (Corporate Website)
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Rosetta Stone Inc. (NYSE:RST), a leading provider of technology-based language-learning solutions, announced today that Stephen Swad will join the management team as chief financial officer effective November 9, 2010. Reporting directly to Tom Adams, the chief executive officer of Rosetta Stone, Swad, 49, will be responsible for Rosetta Stone's finance and investor relations functions. Swad, who has previously served as CFO at Comverse Technology, Fannie Mae and AOL, brings extensive experience in finance and the technology sector to his new role.
"We're delighted to have an executive of Steve's caliber join Rosetta Stone," said Tom Adams, CEO of Rosetta Stone. "He is a gifted CFO, with strong public-company experience - and he brings a business operations perspective to everything he does. Having been a CFO at a Fortune 500 high technology company, combined with his broad experience at complex, fast-paced environments, we are confident that Steve will contribute broadly to our financial operations and business strategy."
"I'm excited to join Rosetta Stone at this point in their evolution," Swad said. "The company addresses a global market sized at over $80 billion, offering the best available technology-based solutions for learning languages. Their latest advances are not only helping people learn through socialization, they are also strengthening the company's business model. I'm confident that this talented team of innovators has the skills and drive to capitalize on a tremendous opportunity to grow globally, extending the company's reach across markets and around the world. I look forward to partnering with Tom and the leadership team to create value for all of our stakeholders."
In September, the company introduced Rosetta Stone(R) Version 4 TOTALe(TM), the innovative language-learning solution that pairs trusted Rosetta Stone software with an entirely new online experience. This allows people to 'awaken' their natural ability to learn a new language. Version 4 TOTALe works through effective software and online activities that encourage customers to interact safely with native speakers and other learners, at their own level, to use their newly acquired skills.
Rosetta Stone (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces that Imran Maskatia will be joining Redbox as their VP, Digital Media Technology. Prior to Redbox, Imran was a Lead Program Manager for Microsoft's Media Platforms Business. He focuses on the next generation of interconnected media experiences across TVs, PCs, Mobile Devices, and Game Consoles. Over the past 12 years, he has designed and developed interactive media experiences for Microsoft's service provider customers, including Comcast, Verizon, AT&T, and others around the world. Previously, Imran spent time at various startups in the valley, IBM, and also built networked entertainment technologies at Digital Equipment Corporation's Network Systems Laboratory in Palo Alto. He received a BS and an MS from Stanford University, focusing on Human-Computer Interaction. In his spare time, he enjoys working with Muslim community organizations, spending time outdoors, playing video games, and learning useless trivia - resulting in an appearance on Jeopardy! last year.
Redbox (Corporate Website)
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REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Oct. 18 /PRNewswire/ -- RockYou today announced the appointment of Jonathan Knight, former executive at Electronic Arts and Activision, as Senior Vice President of RockYou Games.
With over fifteen years of experience producing and directing games, Knight has been a major contributor to leading franchises like Star Trek, Quake, Wolfenstein, and The Simpsons. At EA's Maxis Studio, he produced several expansion packs to The Sims (the most successful PC game in history), and was Lead Producer and a creative leader for the universally-acclaimed The Sims 2. As Vice President and Executive Producer at EA's Visceral Games studio, he was the creator of the hit game, Dante's Inferno.
Prior to his nine-year tenure at Electronic Arts, Knight held a management position as Executive Producer at Activision. He has also managed game production at other major publishers, including Interplay and Viacom New Media. Jonathan is a passionate gamer, and grew up playing and making games on the family Apple II that still sits in his office.
"I am thrilled to have Jonathan bring his wealth of experience and leadership to RockYou," says Lisa Marino, COO. "Jonathan is a creative force in gaming, and his exceptional track record in commercially - and critically-successful games will drive RockYou's growth and set a new direction for social gaming."
"The next chapter of social gaming will be defined by quality and innovation. We've barely opened the book on this story, and as more game makers gravitate toward this exciting platform, we can expect a whole new wave of social game design and online entertainment. RockYou took an early leadership role in this space, and is now poised to be a major player in the future," said Knight.
RockYou (Corporate Website)
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Greg Fant is an e-commerce veteran with extensive experience in product and marketing strategy and development, distribution and management. Prior to One Kings Lane, Greg spent 10 years at eBay where he most recently held the position of vice president of North America marketing. In this role, he was responsible for all North America marketing functions, as well as development and management of global marketing infrastructure development. He oversaw eBay’s substantial marketing budget and managed a team of more than 100.
Greg held additional senior management roles at eBay ranging from vice president of eBay buyer experience, vice president of global customer analytics, vice president of eBay global product strategy and seller product management, and vice president and divisional merchandise manager. In these roles, he developed and executed eBay’s North America end-to-end buyer experience strategy for product and marketing, managed all of eBay’s customer insights teams, overhauled the company’s web analytics tracking and measurement infrastructure, developed eBay’s first experimental testing platform, and scaled business results in hundreds of eBay Categories.
Greg also served as senior director of U.S. marketing, director of eBay sports, and senior category manager of the sporting goods category and new category development. In these roles, he was responsible for development and execution of buyer focused merchandising and marketing plans for 50 percent of eBay US categories, managed the eBay sports business and launched 100’s of new eBay categories.
Earlier in his career, Greg held positions at The Coca-Cola Company, Feld Entertainment, Cerrell Associates and also worked as a staff aide for the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton-Gore campaign.
One Kings Lane (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces that Jonathan Kowit will be joining Ice.com as their CMO. Jonathan Kowit is an experienced marketer and business executive who has worked in the interactive space since 1998. Jonathan came to Ice.com from Audible.com (an Amazon company), where he was the VP of Marketing for 4 1/2 years during a time in which Audible grew by over 200%. Prior to Audible, Jonathan was the VP of International Marketing at Weightwatchers.com for 4 years, where he managed marketing teams in the UK, Germany, Canada and Australia. Prior to Weightwatchers Jonathan founded a first mover in the online dating space, Metrodate.com. Before Metrodate, Jonathan was an attorney that focused on class action antitrust litigation.
Ice.com (Corporate Website)
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RecycleBank, the premier green rewards program that motivates people to take environmental actions, announced today that veteran media and Internet executive Jonathan Hsu has been named Chief Executive Officer of the Company. Mr. Hsu was most recently Chief Executive Officer of 24/7 Real Media, the leaders behind the science of digital marketing and part of WPP, the world leader in marketing communications. Hsu is an accomplished international business leader who brings years of media, marketing and Internet expertise to RecycleBank.
"RecycleBank is thrilled to be able to attract a leader like Jonathan to the Company," said Ron Gonen, Co-Founder of RecycleBank. "Jon's extensive media and marketing background will allow RecycleBank to significantly accelerate our global growth and expansion plans, and will be an incredible asset in recruiting the world's leading brands to join the movement to motivate individuals and communities to engage in positive green actions."
"RecycleBank has accomplished a great deal in its relatively short history; they've built a large community of engaged members that are motivated to have a positive impact on the environment," Hsu said. "Now is the perfect time to bring this momentum to a broader audience, as green initiatives are becoming a mandatory element of any successful brand's marketing strategy. There is extraordinary opportunity for brands to join RecycleBank's mission to motivate green actions and create incredible value for our Members, partners, employees and shareholders. I certainly look forward to the journey ahead."
"The Board and the leadership team of RecycleBank could not be more thrilled at the choice of Jonathan Hsu as Chief Executive Officer," said Stuart Ellman, co-founder of RRE Ventures and the RecycleBank Board member who led the search process. "He comes to us from a world leader in media marketing and communications at a time where corporations are realizing their ability and responsibility to effecting change on our environment. We look forward to building on RecycleBank's track record of innovation and positive environmental impact together."
This leadership evolution comes at an important time for RecycleBank. The company has had a tremendous impact on the environment to date- the material recycled by the households it services has saved cities tens of millions of dollars annually in landfill disposal fees, and has saved over 1.5 million trees and millions of gallons of oil. RecycleBank wants to expand this to a global level, using the digital medium to grow its community, deepen engagement among members and build meaningful marketing partnerships with brands like The Coca-Cola Company, Nature Made, Kashi and Yoplait. To catalyze this growth, Mr. Hsu will work with RecycleBank to introduce green rewards programs to the WPP client base and other eco-conscious brands, and roll out new product offerings that will enable municipalities and partners to innovate from a sustainability point of view. Mr. Hsu will officially take office on October 4, 2010.
About RecycleBank
RecycleBank® motivates people to take greener actions and rewards consumers with points that can be redeemed at participating local and national business partners. Through collaboration and innovation, RecycleBank is helping to create a culture that encourages people to take simple steps towards greener lifestyles like residential recycling, electronic-waste recycling, home energy conservation and more. We believe that making greener choices shouldn't at all feel like a trade off—it should be a trade up—and RecycleBank rewards its members every step of the way. RecycleBank currently provides service to over one million people across the U.S. and the U.K. and has been recognized with a number of business and environmental awards, including being named as a Technology Pioneer by the World Economic Forum, as a Champion of the Earth by the United Nations Environmental Programme, and for Outstanding Excellence in Public/Private Partnerships from the U.S. Conference of Mayors. RecycleBank is headquartered in New York City. For more information, visit www.RecycleBank.com.
Jonathan K. Hsu Bio
Jonathan K. Hsu was the former Chief Executive Officer of 24/7 Real Media, the leading global digital marketing company whose award-winning Open AdStream® ad management technology powers more than 45,000 web sites to deliver over 800 billion ads, including 24/7 Real Media's proprietary global ad network, reaching approximately 200 million unique visitors across three continents. Since its acquisition by WPP in 2007, 24/7 Real Media is now driving the digital technology strategy across the world's largest marketing company.
RecycleBank (Corporate Website)
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SecondMarket (Corporate Website)
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Mr. Kirincich joins ReputationDefender with a unique blend of experience on Wall Street in mergers and acquisitions and in the Valley high tech management. Most recently, Mr. Kirincich was CFO of Extend Health. Prior to joining Extend Health, he was Vice President of Financial Planning and Analysis at Netflix. He also has held finance and marketing positions with startups Nexsi Systems and iReady Corporation, and with Lucent Technologies, Octel Communications and Tandem Computers. Mr. Kirincich earned an M.B.A. from The Wharton School and a B.A. in Math and Economics from Wesleyan University.
About ReputationDefender
ReputationDefender is the pioneer and global leader in online reputation and privacy management. The privately held company has advanced technology, unique business processes and a suite of products designed for all consumer segments — including professionals, small business owners, students, social Web enthusiasts, parents and more — that make it easier to control online reputations and protect against Internet stalking, identity theft/impersonation and other online threats. ReputationDefender has its headquarters in Silicon Valley, an office in Germany and serves customers in more than 100 countries. For more information, please visit www.reputationdefender.com.
Reputation.com (Corporate Website)
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Liberty joined CNNMoney from Microsoft Corporation, where she was Vice President of sales at DRIVEpm, a key business unit in Microsoft’s Advertising and Publishing solutions division (formerly aQuantive). Under Carras’ leadership, DRIVEpm became one of the largest premium ad networks. Prior to joining DRIVEpm, she managed national agency relations at LookSmart and sold for Lexmark International, Inc. Carras has been a board member of numerous interactive groups and is a frequent speaker at events such as AdTech, SIIA, The Sellers Forum, and the DreamForce/Salesforce.com Global Conference. She graduated with her BA from San Francisco State University in 1999.
Fox Audience Network (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces that Aaron Barnes will be joining Lockerz as their CRO. He brings over 18 years of experience in sales, marketing and operations with an impressive track record in online advertising sales, business development and subscriptions. Aaron has held senior sales, marketing and business development roles at Sequoia Capital backed Quote.com (Lycos Finance), Trident Capital backed WhenU, Inc., and publicly traded Looksmart (NASDAQ: LOOK). Aaron's global sales strategies and tactics implemented have resulted in Friendster scaling revenue to historic company highs in 2006 and 2007 while in parallel significantly improving the synergistic efficiencies of strategic business alliances. Aaron holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from University of Pennsylvania and studied Entrepreneurial Management at The Wharton School of Business.
Lockerz (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces that Rob Schmults will be joining Intent Media as their VP, Strategic Partnerships. Before Intent Media, Rob was CMO at Smart Destinations, a ticketing platform for museums, sights, and tours. He oversaw online and offline marketing, as well as the web store responsible for 70% of the company's B2C sales. Previously, Rob spent several years at GSI Commerce, leading a group that managed 30 online and catalog businesses, including Sports Authority, Bath & Body Works, and iRobot. Earlier in his career, Rob worked for Fort Point Partners, McKinsey & Co., and Worlds Inc. Rob holds a BA from Yale, an M.Phil from Cambridge, and an MBA from Harvard.
Intent Media (Corporate Website)
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As CPMO, Louis leads a team that is responsible for leveraging data, technology and marketing expertise to bring to market a suite of products and services that enables millions of local businesses to effectively market themselves without having to spend a significant amount of time, energy and money.
Prior to joining Yodle, Louis was Senior Vice-President, Global Products at Monster Worldwide where he and his team spearheaded a major transformation of the company’s value-proposition through the delivery of an unprecedented amount of product innovations. Prior to his US assignment, Louis was Vice-President of Product and Marketing at Monster in Canada where he was named “Marketer that Matters” by the Marketing Magazine and “Personality of the Year” by the Montreal chapter of the American Marketing Association. Prior to Monster, Louis had built a long and successful career as an Internet and Social entrepreneur around the world.
Louis received a BBA from Laval University and an MSc in Marketing from HEC-Montreal. His work has been featured in many business magazines, including The Economist.
Yodle (Corporate Website)
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Daversa Partners announces that Virl Hill will be joining Blade Games as their CEO. Virl most recently was Senior Director of Business Development for Consumer Video Services at RealNetworks, leading the team by creating and managing strategic partnerships for SuperPass, Starz! Ticket on Real Movies, the Real Guide and Real's future consumer video products and services. Prior to RealNetworks, Virl led The Walt Disney Company's network television and television animation strategic planning group, focusing on production and global distribution strategy for prime time and syndicated programming including Home Improvement and The Disney Afternoon and for Disney's direct-to-video feature animation sequel initiative. He began his media career in international home video and merchandising at Hanna-Barbera Productions. Virl also worked in international investment banking with Credit Suisse First Boston in New York and Australia. Virl is a member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and serves on the Board of the Cable Television Association for Marketing (CTAM) Silicon Valley/Pacific Northwest Chapter. He holds an MBA and a BA from Northwestern University and also studied at the London Business School.
Blade Games (Corporate Website)
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Lakhani is an experienced financial executive with a successful track record at public and private growth companies in the technology, media and telecommunications industries. He has served in various financial management roles for the past 26 years and, as part of oDesk's executive management team, will play a key role developing the company's growth strategy. Most recently, Lakhani was CFO of Yandex, the largest search engine in Russia. During his tenure as CFO at CTC Media, Lakhani led the company to a successful initial public offering (IPO).
"Our CFO position generated a lot of interest and we had the opportunity to meet with many impressive candidates," said Swart. "We quickly recognized that Nilesh was the right person for oDesk. He was the CFO at CTC Media while revenue tripled, and his success in scaling the international finance organization of a fast growing company will be important to oDesk in the coming years."
"After meeting with Gary and the rest of the team, I was highly impressed with the company's drive and sense of purpose to help people build successful online work relationships," said Lakhani. "oDesk has assembled a world-class team that is achieving remarkable results both for its users and as a business. I'm excited to join this effort, this industry and this company."
oDesk recently marked four consecutive years of annual growth in excess of 100 percent, and has generated over $170 million in online work performed.
oDesk (Corporate Website)
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Prior to AOL, David served as a management consultant for A.T. Kearney advising Fortune 500 companies on corporate and operating strategy. He currently is a board director to PrecisionIR Group, board advisor to Assistly, LiveIntent and VigLink, and an angel investor in SimpleGeo and Blockchalk. David graduated from Purdue University with a B.S. in Industrial Engineering and received his MBA from Columbia Business School.
Knewton (Corporate Website)
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Whitney commented that, "Blair brings an exceptional background and track record to Moontoast. His proven ability to successfully lead teams in innovative ventures will enhance our current operations and guide Moontoast to becoming the leader in the social commerce market. He brings with him considerable experience from both Fortune 100 companies and entrepreneurial startups. Blair's unique skill set in sales, e-commerce and affiliate marketing make him a great asset to the Moontoast team."
Heavey brings over twenty years of senior management and leadership experience in startup environments. He is a veteran Internet executive with proven expertise in creating new businesses, implementing initiatives, and driving execution in companies. His tenure as Director of Sales at Open Market and Executive Vice President at Be Free demonstrated a strong executive leadership record with a proven ability to build high impact sales and marketing teams.
Heavey's past experience also includes: President and CEO of MyPerfectGig; Entrepreneur-in-Residence at North Bridge Venture Partners; and CEO of DirectoryM. He received his BA in Computer Science and Political Science from Boston College and earned his MBA from Babson College. He currently serves on the Board of Directors at Mall Networks, a leading provider of merchant-funded loyalty shopping solutions, as well as the advisory boards of two additional startups.
"Moontoast is providing solutions in an exciting multi-billion dollar market opportunity. It is carving out the 'rules of success' for brands to leverage social media to drive significant revenue streams." Heavey stated, "The team that Marcus and Stephen Collins built is well on its way to driving a unique and differentiated social commerce platform that brands will eagerly engage with to increase revenues. I'm excited to be part of the Moontoast team."
Moontoast (Corporate Website)
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Recognized Industry Leader to Drive Continued Innovation and Growth in the Semantic Advertising Space
New York (April 9, 2010) - Peer39 today announced it has named Andy Ellenthal as chief executive officer. Ellenthal will lead the online semantic advertising company's efforts to accelerate business growth and further innovate the online advertising space. In addition, Peer39 Founder Amiad Solomon will be named President of the Company and will concentrate his efforts on business development, product innovation and strategic initiatives.
Semantic advertising increases the value of online content by understanding meaning and sentiment, and matches the most relevant ad to the page. Using Peer39's patented algorithms, publishers, ad exchanges, and buying platforms can classify the true meaning of written language at lightning speed. Peer39 now helps semantically target thousands of ads every second.
"Peer39 is widely recognized as the inventor and market leader in semantic advertising. We're delighted that Andy's vast experience, coupled with his success scaling innovative advertising technology companies, will accelerate Peer39's ascension as the industry standard," said Solomon. "Andy has a track record of scaling companies in the online advertising space and will be a tremendous asset as we achieve the next level of market dominance for Peer39."
Ellenthal brings a combination of media sales, technological savvy and creativity to Peer39. He previously served as the CEO of quadrantONE, a joint venture of four major media companies focused on selling online advertising. Ellenthal has also held positions such as SVP of Sales at PointRoll, the leading provider of rich media marketing services, and a number of senior sales management roles at DoubleClick, the largest internet's ad serving company.
"Peer39 has a tremendous opportunity to innovate the industry through the use of semantics. It's an exciting time to join the Company and help capitalize on the growing online market," said Ellenthal. "The online advertising space has just begun to see the positive advantages of implementing semantics into an online strategy and I look forward to driving the Company and further setting a Peer39 as the semantic targeting standard in the industry."
Peer39 (Corporate Website)
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Rent the Runway (Corporate Website)
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Journalism Online (Corporate Website)
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OnForce Appoints Bill Lucchini as Chief Operating Officer Hires Former Intuit Executive to Support OnForce Growth
BOSTON – June 23, 2010 – OnForce, the leading on-site services marketplace that matches service buyers with service professionals to fulfill information technology and consumer electronic work, has appointed Bill Lucchini as Chief Operating Officer (COO). In his new role at OnForce, Lucchini will oversee the development, product, and marketing organizations, and will focus on aligning strategic goals with operational activities.
“Bill is an established leader with a long track-record of notable accomplishments,” said Peter Cannone, CEO of OnForce. “As OnForce continues to grow and evolve, Bill offers excellent product management and leadership expertise to effectively support OnForce’s commitment to providing service excellence.”
With more than 17 years of experience at Intuit building software and services, Lucchini brings extensive product development and leadership experience to OnForce. Most recently, Lucchini was Vice President and General Manager for the Intuit Platform as a Service Group where he led Intuit’s QuickBase business and launched the Intuit Partner Platform. Previous to this role, Lucchini was Vice President and General Manager for the Intuit Mid Market Group, where he launched Intuit’s first channel, the Intuit Solution Provider Program.
Lucchini will actively meet with service buyers and service professionals to gather their insights about how OnForce is driving their business growth today and into the future. In addition, as OnForce continues to expand and deepen its market presence, Lucchini will look to supplement the OnForce team with new talent.
“I am very impressed by the large volume of service events that is successfully fulfilled via the OnForce marketplace; it is the primary reason why I joined the OnForce team,” said Lucchini.
“It is clear that this established model provides significant value for service buyers and service professionals. I am excited to be part of an organization that shows great service strength and innovation with a very promising future.”
Lucchini will be based at OnForce headquarters in Lexington, Massachusetts.
About OnForce
OnForce is the leading outsourced services network that connects service buyers with thousands of highly skilled service professionals to fulfill on-site work. With more than one million service events completed, OnForce is the trusted marketplace that enables service buyers to lower service costs, improve service-level agreement compliance, achieve high customer satisfaction, and generate new streams of revenue quickly. The OnForce community is comprised of IT and CE service buyers and service professionals, located across the U.S. and Canada, who specialize in a variety of categories, such as computers, printers, networking, VoIP, Point of Sale, and more. For additional information, please visit www.onforce.com.
OnForce (Corporate Website)
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World Golf Tour (Corporate Website)
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Redwood City, CA — June 3, 2010 — Lending Club, the world’s leading peer lending network, today announced it passed $10 million in monthly loan fundings for May 2010. This milestone marks the first time any U.S. peer lending company has funded that amount of loans in a single calendar month. Lending Club also announces the appointment of Scott Sanborn as chief marketing officer.
“Customers are getting back on their feet and looking to get rid of their high interest rate credit card debt. Banks still aren’t helping, so an increasing number of customers are coming to us for an easy, lower interest option without the fine print,” said Renaud Laplanche, CEO of Lending Club. “We are excited about our continued growth, and welcome Scott as our new head of marketing to expand our reach.”
Lending Club reduces the cost and complexity of lending by cutting out banks. Bringing investors and credit worthy borrowers together enables Lending Club to offer borrowers some of the lowest rates around for personal unsecured loans while providing investors higher returns (currently investors are earning a 9.5% net annualized return on Lending Club notes).
Scott Sanborn was previously the chief marketing and revenue officer for eHealth, Inc., a publicly traded e-commerce company. While at eHealth, Scott led double digit growth in revenue and new customer acquisitions. Prior to his role at eHealth, Sanborn was the chief marketing officer and interim president of the popular e-commerce and catalog retailer, RedEnvelope, Inc., where he oversaw the sale of the business to Provide Commerce.
“I am thrilled to be joining the Lending Club team,” said Sanborn. “Lending Club is on track to become a truly great financial services brand, and my experience growing online companies and creating strong brands is a perfect match.”
Prior to joining RedEnvelope, Sanborn held several senior marketing positions at the Home Shopping Network, the television and Internet retailer of consumer products, including senior vice president of marketing. He was instrumental in growing Home Shopping Network’s online business, led an award-winning creative team, and created a new brand position and identity for the company.
Additional information about Lending Club is available in the prospectus for Lending Club's notes, which can be obtained on Lending Club's Web site at http://www.lendingclub.com/info/prospectus.action.
About Lending Club
Lending Club is a peer lending network bringing together investors and creditworthy borrowers. Lending Club eliminates the high cost and complexity of traditional bank lending to offer borrowers better rates and investors better returns. Lending Club won the Webby Award in 2008 for the "Best Banking Website" and has been nominated for "Top 100 Innovators" by The Industry Standard. It was recently recognized as one of the 20 "Breakthrough Ideas for 2009" by Harvard Business Review. Founded in 2006, Lending Club is headquartered in Redwood City, CA. More information is available at: http://www.lendingclub.com.
Lending Club Notes are only offered by a prospectus filed with the SEC which contains the risks and uncertainties related to any investment in the Notes. Currently only residents of the following states may invest in Lending Club notes: CA, CO, CT, DE, FL, GA, HI, ID, IL, KY (accredited investors), LA, ME, MN, MO, MS, MT, NH, NV, NY, RI, SC, SD, UT, VA, WA, WI, WV, or WY.
Loans are not issued in IA, ID, IN, KS, ME, MS, NC, ND, NE, or TN. Loans are issued by WebBank, an FDIC insured Utah chartered industrial bank located in Salt Lake City, Utah. Borrowers must be US citizens or permanent residents and at least 18 years old. Valid bank account and social security numbers are required. All loans are subject to credit approval.
Lending Club (Corporate Website)
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Former Top Executive at Yahoo!, Right Media and DoubleClick Brings Unparalleled Expertise To Establish Company as Leading Operating System for Media Buying
CHICAGO, June 1 /PRNewswire/ -- MediaBank, a leading provider of technology solutions designed to help better manage the end-to-end media buying and analytics process, today announced that Bill Wise, a highly accomplished executive known for building next generation media technologies that have major impact on the advertising field, is joining the company as Chief Executive Officer. Wise succeeds MediaBank CEO and founder Brad Keywell, who remains with the company as a Director and advisor. The Chief Executive Officer search was conducted by premier executive retained search firm Daversa Partners, and was lead by search Partner Peter Baiocco.
Throughout his career, Wise has demonstrated leadership in identifying and cultivating advanced media buying solutions. He comes to MediaBank from Yahoo! where he was General Manager, Ad Platforms & Global Exchange. In that position he was responsible for the company's advertising platforms business including the Right Media Exchange, a premium digital advertising exchange, and APT by Yahoo!, the online leader's intelligent media planning/buying platform.
Wise joined Yahoo! from his former role as President of Right Media, running its media and services businesses. Yahoo! acquired Right Media in 2007 for $850 million, bringing Wise on board and integrating Right Media's Exchange as the solution for Yahoo!'s entire non-guaranteed, spot market inventory.
Before his time with Right Media, Wise was CEO of Didit, the largest independent search marketing firm, from 2005 to 2007. Under his guidance the company had a three-year growth rate of 1,368%, ranking it #137 in the Inc 500 listing of America's fastest-growing private companies. Wise also spent five years at DoubleClick in various executive posts including Vice President and General Manager of DoubleClick Media, and Director of Financial Planning & Investor Relations where he was responsible for guiding Wall Street and company shareholders.
"Bill Wise has a profound ability to see the value new technologies are creating across the media buying spectrum. He also has a proven talent for developing those technologies for the benefit of ad agencies, publishers, advertisers and networks," said Keywell. "We are fortunate to have Bill assume leadership of MediaBank as we continue our quest to redefine the way media, across the entire spectrum of channels and properties, is purchased."
"Media buying is undergoing a major transformation from pre-arranged buys on disconnected media properties, to a new cross-media model that targets ads at tightly-defined audiences in real time across both traditional and digital media," said Wise. "MediaBank has helped lead this transformation. With tens of billions in media spend currently managed through our platforms, our clients are already reaping the workflow efficiencies and advanced analytics of MediaBank's technologies.
"Given the success of MediaBank to date, I believe the potential for further growth is enormous," Wise continued. "We intend to aggressively further MediaBank's position as the de facto resource for technology infrastructure, operating standards, and real-time access to every form of media, both traditional and digital. We believe we can become the holistic operating system that simplifies and adds efficiency to the entire media marketplace, and help ad agencies and marketers route inventory in real time—creating the 'smart router' for the entire advertising marketplace."
About MediaBank, Inc.
Privately-held Chicago-based MediaBank, Inc. is a leading provider of integrated procurement technology and advanced analytics to the advertising industry. MediaBank solutions allow for unprecedented cross-media analytics and intelligence through superior planning, buying, workflow and data warehousing tools. The cornerstone of MediaBank's solution is the MediaBank O|X platform, offering buying, financial, and workflow tools across all media types. The MediaBank A|X platform provides advanced analytics and predictive modeling. MediaBank has more than 25 years of industry recognized experience in providing media buying solutions and is committed to combining the latest technologies and applications to improve efficiency in the advertising industry. For more information on MediaBank, visit: www.mbxg.com.
MediaBank (Corporate Website)
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Gounares joined AOL from Microsoft, where he was Corporate Vice President and Chief Technology Officer for the company's Online Services Division. During his tenure at Microsoft, Gounares led significant strategic and technical operations for some of the company's most important projects including Microsoft's global advertising platform, Bing search, MSN and Microsoft Virtual Earth. Gounares also served for three years as Technology Advisor to Microsoft Chairman and founder Bill Gates, as well as Corporate Vice President of Corporate Strategy in Microsoft's Finance Department.
Prior to joining Microsoft in 1993, Gounares worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory. He has founded two startups and is also an inventor on more than 100 U.S. patents filed and pending.
Gounares holds a bachelor's degree cum laude in Computer Science from Princeton University.
AOL (Corporate Website)
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Drop.io (Corporate Website)
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Smartling (Corporate Website)
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The Gilt Groupe (Corporate Website)
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Ustream (Corporate Website)
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As the former CMO of Boston-based Utterli, Aaron worked closely with founders Paul Gagne and Michael Bayer to re-launch the struggling Utterz micro-blogging service and created the sustainable media property now utilized by large enterprises like eBay, RedCross and Whole Foods for variety initiatives requiring multi-channel, multimedia group communications. Prior to this role, Aaron applied his background in consumer marketing and strengths in start-up operations, business development and fund raising as Vice President of Marketing during the transformation of Jangl’s subscription and licensing business.
Aaron was one of the first five employees at PodShow, heading up marketing and communications. He also has led all outbound and product marketing efforts for Stata Labs (acquired by Yahoo) and co-founded Alterlayer, a sweat equity firm that consulted and invested in a broad array of Silicon Valley-based startups back in 1999. Aaron started his career in marketing communications and production at WebTV and Microsoft’s WebTV (1996-1999). He is a graduate of Stanford University and holds a BA in Political Science.
Outspark (Corporate Website)
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Match.com (Corporate Website)
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Chiang has 17 years of experience in the console game industry, 15 of them at EA. He was most recently senior vice president and group general manager of EA Sports, where he oversaw the Madden NFL football series, one of the most valuable franchises in all of video gamedom.
Mark Pincus, chief executive of Zynga, said on his blog the move will help the company double down on its investments in social gaming. It will also heat up the competition with EA, which recently paid as much as $400 million for Zynga's chief competitor, Playfish. Zynga has a number of other EA veterans on staff, including Mark Skaggs, who oversaw production of FarmVille, Zynga's biggest game with 83 million monthly active users.
During Chiang's time at EA, the company came to dominate the sports game category, minting franchises such as NCAA Football, FIFA Soccer, NHL and NBA Live — all played by millions. He helped relaunch EASports.com and Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online. Chiang was a co-founder of Tiberon Entertainment along with John Schappert, current chief operating officer of EA. EA acquired Tiburon in 1998.
Zynga (Corporate Website)
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Rowghani is now CFO and senior vice president of strategic planning for Pixar, Disney Animation Studios and Disney Toon Studios. Prior to joining Pixar, Rowghani was an associate at management consulting firm McKinsey & Company.
"Ali will be an important member of a growing team focused on creating value for our users and capturing the financial opportunities that result from it," Twitter CEO Evan Williams said in a statement. "His thoughtfulness on retaining a great culture to work and staying consistent with your principles will also be a significant contribution."
Twitter (Corporate Website)
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David Jones joins Shazam from Friendster where he served as Vice President of Global Marketing. Prior to joining Friendster, David held several marketing and general management roles at eBay Inc, including roles focused on scaling the number of active members of the eBay community. David was also the director of eBay's media and entertainment businesses in the United States. Prior to eBay, David was the Vice President of Business Development at Blue Wireless and an Associate Partner at the management and technology consulting firm of Arthur D. Little. David holds a B.A. from Stanford University in Quantitative Economics with Honors & Distinction.
Shazam Entertainment (Corporate Website)
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RecycleBank (Corporate Website)
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OpenSky is based in New York City and is an innovative commerce platform that enables consumer brands and suppliers of products to efficiently and effectively introduce their wares to the rapidly growing retail channel of online influencers (bloggers, authors, celebrities and others with established audience relationships). OpenSky provides these influencers with the tools they need to merchandise, introduce, and sell products they connect with to their audiences.
OpenSky (Corporate Website)
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Targetspot (Corporate Website)
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Big Fish Games (Corporate Website)
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The young, high-growth company behind the Gorillapod, Gorillamobile, and Gorillatorch product lines expands its team and its commitment to product design, brand, and customer-service.
Joby is excited to announce two new additions to its senior management team effective January 19, 2010. The Company is focused on accelerating its incredible growth in 2009, following a record fourth quarter in which the Company, on a preliminary reporting basis, recorded more than $7 million in sales, representing a growth rate of 60% over the fourth quarter of 2008. Joby is currently making considerable investments in its team and global infrastructure to achieve its goals of continually releasing well-designed product solutions, initiating unique and creative brand marketing activities, and supporting its customers.
"Scott and Sargon add a tremendous amount of collective marketing, sales, business development, and operations experience," said Forrest Baringer-Jones, Joby's CEO. "They also share a common DNA with the rest of the Joby team that is committed to thoughtful and user-centric product design, unique marketing initiatives, and customer delight."
As Joby's VP Marketing, Scott Ellis is responsible for product and outbound marketing efforts on a global basis. Scott brings over 15 years of brand and business-building experience at world-class consumer companies including Disney, Starbucks, Microsoft, and Method. Most recently, Scott led New Ventures & Strategic Partnerships at Method Products, Inc., where he focused on strategic marketing and business initiatives to grow the Method brand. Prior to Method, Scott held various marketing and strategy leadership positions at Microsoft, Starbucks, and The Walt Disney Company.
Sargon Eshagh joins the Company as VP Sales - Americas and will be responsible for growing the Company's Americas-based sales and distribution channels. Sargon brings to his position two decades of experience in technology sales and channel marketing with an emphasis on innovative consumer products. Most recently, Eshagh served as Vice President of Sales for Creative Labs, where he was responsible for driving the company's Americas sales.
For additional product or company information, please contact media representative Mark Olson at markolson@maxborgesagency.com.
ABOUT JOBY
Joby creates well designed product solutions that enhance the creative and active capabilities of consumer electronics. The Company revolutionized the camera accessories market in early 2006 with its Gorillapod line of flexible tripods and continues to redefine the consumer electronics market with its Gorillamobile and Gorillatorch product lines. Founded in 2005, Joby is a privately-held company headquartered in San Francisco, CA, with offices in Santa Cruz, CA; Geneva, Switzerland; Singapore and Shenzhen, China. For more information about Joby please visit joby.com.
Joby (Corporate Website)
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Thomson Reuters (Corporate Website)
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OpenSky (Corporate Website)
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Support.com (Corporate Website)
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"We are very pleased to add Lonhyn's experience in building successful, scalable enterprise-class software platforms to the Limelight Networks executive team. His proven track record within the areas of Internet security, distributed high-performance computing, and next-generation digital advertising platforms, as well as his focus on building an environment of innovation within software engineering, will help Limelight continue to differentiate our service offerings in a very dynamic market," said Nathan Raciborski, co-founder and chief technology officer, Limelight Networks, Inc.
Mr. Jasinskyj previously was vice president, engineering at VideoEgg, a rich media content and advertising company. Prior to VideoEgg, he led Software Development at IronPort Systems, a leader in email and network security appliances and spam and malware prevention systems that was acquired by Cisco Systems in 2007. Mr. Jasinskyj also co-founded Lohika, one of the largest offshore software development companies in Eastern Europe, and was an early participant at Zembu Labs, a distributed database technology company.
In addition, Mr. Jasinskyj has eight years of both management and research and development experience at NASA's Ames Research Center in the massively parallel computing and scientific visualization fields. His earlier background includes architecting large-scale software systems at ATX Inc., a major independent telephone company as well as research in robotics, machine vision, and distributed computing in an academic environment.
Mr. Jasinskyj studied both Computer Science and Engineering, as well as Biology at the University of Pennsylvania.
Lime Light Networks (Corporate Website)
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"Michael and Ian are both high-performance, proven leaders who fit superbly within our values-driven culture," said Lewis. "I am delighted that we have the benefit of their stewardship in finance and technology, two areas critical to us as we build toward our vision. Ian's experience in managing technology strategy and teams in a dynamic Internet media company will be invaluable as we adapt and scale. Similarly, Michael's experience in corporate finance, acquisitions, investor communications and strategic development at rapid-growth companies will be tremendously helpful as we expand globally."
During Mr. Vernon's five years (2000-2006) with global digital-marketing company aQuantive, he helped guide the company to profitability and a multi-billion dollar market cap before the company was acquired by Microsoft in 2007 for $6 billion. More recently, Mr. Vernon served as CFO of Zumobi, Inc., a mobile phone technology startup. Mr. Vernon also served as CFO within the hotel industry, including NYSE-traded Red Lion Hotels and Park Plaza International. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics and a master's degree in business administration from Stanford University.
"I'm excited to have the opportunity to join Big Fish Games," said Vernon. "The energy and strong entrepreneurial spirit I've observed among employees here is really wonderful. This is clearly a terrific global company that is carving out a strong position in a rapidly-growing industry. I'm thrilled to be part of the team that will pave the way for even greater successes in the future."
Mr. Hurlock-Jones served as chief information officer at Fox Interactive Media, where he was responsible for IT operations relating to social media, gaming and image-hosting platforms, including IGN, Fox Sports, Photobucket and DPG. During his tenure at Buy.com, he scaled the infrastructure and technology to help grow the business from $126 million to $692 million, in two years. Mr. Hurlock-Jones holds an advanced diploma in management and economics from Guilford Technical College, Surrey.
"I am thrilled to be joining such a cutting-edge company," said Hurlock-Jones. "I was attracted to Big Fish Games because of the balance of unfettered creativity and thoughtful business leadership. I'm looking forward to being a part of a leadership team that understands and values technology. The camaraderie of the employees, the culture and solid reputation were key factors in my joining Big Fish Games."
About Big Fish Games
Founded in 2002, Big Fish Games is a multi-platform developer and distributor of casual games, including downloadable, social, MMO, console and mobile games. Renowned for offering A New Game Every Day!, Big Fish Games distributes 1.5 million games per day worldwide. With headquarters in Seattle, Wash., and offices in Vancouver, B.C., and Cork, Ireland, Big Fish Games partners with 500+ game developers and develops and publishes some of the industry's leading brands, including Mystery Case Files, Hidden Expedition, DRAWN, Fairway Solitaire, MY TRIBE and FAUNASPHERE. For more information, visit www.bigfishgames.com.
Big Fish Games (Corporate Website)
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"Since inception, Carlos and the team have built a successful company by developing a compelling product that people are passionate about," said Braff. "I am excited to be working with the Scrapblog team on its goal of making self-expression and multimedia storytelling an easy and fun way for everyone to share the joy and prized moments in their lives with others."
Since joining Glu Mobile in 2003, Braff's understanding of the digital entertainment marketplace and evolving consumer behavior has helped shape the way mobile games are marketed and launched today. In 2008, Braff was named by Digital Media Wire as one of the top 25 digital entertainment executives to watch and in 2007 she was honored as one of the 40 most influential people under 40 in Silicon Valley by the Silicon Valley Business Journal, and in 2006 Braff was named one of the game industry's 100 most influential women by Next Generation.
"As the founder, I could not be more proud of our selection to lead Scrapblog going forward," said Garcia. "We have built a compelling product and we have learned a lot about selling virtual goods inside a creative platform. Now, Jill will take this offering to the next level. I look forward to working with her and supporting her strategy to maximize the potential of Scrapblog."
Prior to joining Glu Mobile, Braff held senior marketing positions at Sega of America and Konami of America. In addition to her gaming experience, Braff also held management positions at consumer web service companies Photopoint Corporation and Ancestry.com. She also held positions at The Learning Company, Nintendo of America and Griffin Bacal. Braff has a B.A. from Colgate University.
"We are thrilled to see the appointment of somebody of Jill's caliber appointed to the role of CEO at Scrapblog. The board has full confidence in Jill's demonstrated leadership ability, and the value of her industry experience is clear," said David Min, Principal of Steamboat Ventures, the venture capital affiliate of The Walt Disney Company and a member of Scrapblog's board of directors.
Scrapblog (Corporate Website)
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The Gilt Groupe (Corporate Website)
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Najafi said Fine has the "perfect background" to help build the Direct Brands business, citing her experience in turning around companies and using the Internet to market to women. "I've dedicated my career developing brands for women," Fine said, adding that direct marketing channel for books, music and movies "is far from maximized." (Figures from PubTrack Consumer show 65% of book club customers are women). Najafi and Fine both see Direct Brands adding more online channels and possibly more products to its existing mix. While Fine said she intends to respect the current business, she noted that the direct marketing channel "is a business prime for reinvention," Fine said. Najafi said he is "more convinced today than when we bought the business" about the opportunity to expand, noting Direct Brands' access to content and 6.5 million customers. Najafi said he will to continue to invest in the company as Fine rolls out her plans in the coming weeks.
Fine joined NBC Universal in 2006 as President, iVillage Properties, where she was responsible for leading one of the world's first and largest online communities for women. With 27 million members globally, the iVillage portfolio of businesses includes iVillage.com, Your Total Health.com, Gardenweb.com, iVillageUK.com and Astrology.com.
Direct Brands, Inc. (Corporate Website)
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MediaMath (Corporate Website)
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LendingTree.com (Corporate Website)
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A veteran finance executive, Grewal brings over 20 years of experience with both fast-growing technology companies and global consumer brands to TheLadders.com. He has previously held senior management and financial positions with VistaPrint Limited, GoldenSource Corporation, eGain Communications and PepsiCo.
"Harpreet will be a critical addition to TheLadders.com as we continue to grow and expand our presence throughout the world," said Marc Cenedella, Founder and CEO of TheLadders.com. "His experience with both growth-oriented technology and Internet companies as well as much larger, global brands will give us great perspective." Most recently, Grewal served as executive vice president and chief financial officer of VistaPrint Limited (NASDAQ: VPRT), a leading online supplier of marketing products and services to small businesses. Prior to that, he was executive vice president and chief financial officer at GoldenSource Corporation, a global software provider of enterprise data management solutions for financial institutions. Previously, Grewal served as chief financial officer of eGain Communications, a provider of CRM software solutions. Prior to eGain, Grewal held several management roles with PepsiCo and its subsidiaries, including chief financial officer for the North America Fountain Beverage Division.
Grewal received a BA in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley and an MA in International Relations from Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
TheLadders.com is the Internet's premier job search platform for $100K+ job seekers. TheLadders.com only posts $100K+ job listings the majority of which are for C-level, vice president, director and manager positions. According to an independent survey of recruiters focusing on $100K+ talent, TheLadders.com ranked #1 for overall satisfaction when compared to all major online competitors.¹ TheLadders.com was recently named Best Employment Website at the 2009 Webby Awards.
TheLadders.com (Corporate Website)
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1Life Healthcare (Corporate Website)
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Umber's patent-pending solution offers the first real-time, automated, and transparent approach for carriers, content providers, and advertisers to extract revenue based on unprecedented visibility and insight into mobile usage. Umber is led by world-class mobile experts and backed by leading venture capitalists.
Umber Systems (Corporate Website)
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"I am excited to be joining the teams at Danoo and IdeaCast at a time when the advertising and media industries are in a period of such great change," said McGuire. "Advertisers are demanding innovative, results-based products centered on their target consumer. The Danoo and IdeaCast products are unique in their ability to reach these consumers at times when they are receptive to offers and brand messages."
Founding CEO Aileen Lee, a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, will become the chair of the company's board and return to her role at the venture capital firm.
"In the last year, Danoo has built some of the most attractive inventory and advanced technology platforms in one of the fastest growing areas of the media world," said Lee. "Our strong financial position and backing from National CineMedia and Kleiner Perkins put Danoo and IdeaCast in a phenomenal position to accelerate this growth. Garry's passion for the business and his extensive background in building and consolidating media businesses makes him the ideal person to lead the company down this exciting path."
McGuire has 15 years of advertising, marketing and general business experience on the client-side as a chief marketing officer and on the agency-side of the business as president of several domestic and international advertising agencies. Most recently, McGuire was the chairman of Icon Internet Ventures, which owns and publishes websites that aggregate target audiences.
Danoo is one of the fastest growing digital location-based media networks, delivering relevant messages and targeted advertising in major metro areas nationwide. The company delivers Nielsen-measured cable television to health club users and airline travelers through its IdeaCast Captive TV platform. In addition, it provides targeted digital media to urban professionals in coffeehouses, cafes and airports in top markets through its Danoo Digital Media platform.
About Danoo
Danoo is a leading digital location-based media company that delivers relevant media to highly desirable audiences when and where they are deeply engaged. The company provides cable television to health club users and airline travelers nationwide through its IdeaCast Captive TV platform and highly targeted and interactive media to urban professionals in top markets through its Danoo Digital Media platform. Leveraging the power of its content, digital and mobile technologies, Danoo screens enable deep connections between advertisers and their target consumers when and where they are most relevant.
Reach Media Group (Danoo) (Corporate Website)
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Carroll is a 20-year veteran engineer with deep experience developing product and services in areas including search, email processing, e-commerce, personalization, ad targeting, CRM, data warehousing, order management and financial services. Carroll joins Zynga from leading blog search engine Technorati where he was the VP of Engineering. Prior to joining Technorati, Dorion was Director of Engineering at Postini, Vice President of Engineering and General Manager of Neomeo (which was acquired by Postini), Technologist-in-Residence at Softbank Venture Capital, and Senior Director of Engineering at Excite@Home, among other roles. Dorion has a Bachelor of Arts from Pitzer College, with four years Mathematics / Computer Science at Harvey Mudd College, in Claremont, California.
Zynga (Corporate Website)
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Most recently, Mr. Virzi led the Affiliate Marketing program for Restaurant.com for the last year. Prior to that, Mr. Virzi was the Affiliate Program Manager for TicketsNow.com, where he held that position for the previous three years. Vince has a wealth of experience managing affiliate relationships and has a proven background in SEO and SEM.
Cash4Gold was derived from Albar Precious Metal Refining, which was founded in 2001 with more than 60 years experience in the precious metals business. Since our inception we have grown into one of the largest and most respected precious metal refineries in the United States. We are the only refinery ever to be listed by the prestigious Inc. 500 Magazine for both 2006 and 2007 as one of the fastest growing 500 companies in America. Along with the accomplishment of reaching #129 in Inc. 500 Magazine, we have also achieved the ranking of #57 in Entrepreneur Magazine. Our final success comes from Forbes Magazine being awarded as one of the top companies to watch in 2008.
Cash4Gold (Corporate Website)
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Mike joins Zynga from EA where he most recently served as the General Manager of EA's Los Angeles studio overseeing more than 200 creative and development professionals. Before becoming a studio General Manager, Mike served as VP and Executive Producer for EA's real time strategy games unit. Mike and his team are well known in the games industry for shipping popular games including: Command & Conquer 3 Kane's Wrath, The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth II (2.6MM+ units sold), The Lord of the Rings, The Rise of the Witch-king, among others.
Before building a successful career at EA, Mike co-founded Legend Entertainment Company, a southern California based gaming studio that he successfully sold to GT Interactive, which was subsequently acquired by Atari.
Zynga (Corporate Website)
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Vish joins Zynga from Yandex Labs where he served as CEO for one year. Prior to joining Yandex in 2008, Vish was SVP and General Manager of the Yahoo Search Group. Prior to his role as General Manager, Vish was the Vice President of Yahoo Search Marketing International and International Monetization. Prior to that role, he was Vice President and General Manager of Yahoo's consumer International Search business.
Before joining Yahoo, Vish served as Vice President and General Manager of Inktomi. Under his leadership, the Inktomi Web Search business experienced continued growth, gained significant traction for its paid inclusion programs and made innovative technology enhancements to its search technology. Mr. Makhijani had been with the company since early 1999, and, prior to his role in Web search, he headed-up Inktomi's investor relations program where he built strong relationships with company stakeholders and financial analysts. Before joining Inktomi, Mr. Makhijani worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers in both the company's New York Metro and Silicon Valley practices where he helped Fortune 500 clients and leading technology, media and start up companies with financial reporting, mergers, acquisitions, and public offering issuances.
Mr. Makhijani earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Connecticut.
Zynga (Corporate Website)
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Unisfair (Corporate Website)
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Cash4Gold has appointed Shawn Kernes as their Chief Technology Officer. Cash4Gold, the "As Seen On TV" direct response company, lets consumers send their unwanted jewelry (chains, rings, coins and earrings) in exchange for cash. The company who kicked a PR field goal when they signed Ed McMahon and MC Hammer to star in the 2009 Super Bowl, has grown significantly in the past two years and is headed for unparalleled strategic growth. According to Daversa Partners' Carol Bell who ran the CTO search, "Shawn is drinking from the firehose and loving it. He is an exceptional CTO candidate who brings a tremendous technology skillset and strategic value to the Cash4Gold leadership team".
Shawn Kernes had worked at StubHub when they were a 4-man shop and he helped build StubHub's technology and platform and then scaled the company to be acquired by EBAY. Shawn worked at EBAY for a little over a year before deciding to get back into the start-up world. He joins an ex-EBAY alumni on the Cash4Gold leadership team and is relocating to Florida.
Cash4Gold (Corporate Website)
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Roy joins Zynga from MTV Networks where he served as vice president of premium games and services as well as vice president of consumer products and strategy for MTVN`s Nickelodeon Kids & Family Division. At MTVN, he played a key role in managing and growing several of the world`s largest casual game websites and brands such as AddictingGames.com, Shockwave.com, NickArcade.com and MyNoggin.com. Previously, Sehgal held senior executive roles at venture-backed startups and public companies in the online and digital media industry including Atom Entertainment, InfoSpace and July Systems.
Roy hold a B.S. in Finance and Economics from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
Zynga (Corporate Website)
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Before joining Vibes, Green, a seasoned entrepreneur, served as an integral member of SHOP.COM's executive team since 2005, where he led the sales, merchant operations and business development departments. During his four-year tenure, SHOP.COM posted considerable revenue growth, launched multiple media platforms and significantly expanded their client base. Prior to this position, Green held senior sales and sales leadership roles with Grey, FloNetwork and DoubleClick.
Vibes Media (Corporate Website)
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New York, NY March 26, 2009 - Interactive One, LLC the digital connection for Black America and the digital division of Radio One, Inc. (NASDAQ:ROIAK and ROIA), the largest African-American multimedia company, today announced that Napster CTO David Wolfe will join Interactive One as its Chief Product and Operating Officer. Mr. Wolfe will drive the direction and strategy for Interactive One's network of sites and brands. Additionally, he will be at the forefront of a unique multi-platform play in partnership with Interactive One's parent company, Radio One. Wolfe will manage a staff of approximately 50 people and will report to Interactive One President, Thomas Newman.
"We are excited to bring David on board to enhance our users' experience and to build upon our strong growth and success," said Thomas Newman. "We have a very large and loyal following and we look forward to seeing David apply his proven talents to build upon our innovative products and create new offerings online and across mobile, video and other platforms."
Wolfe is well positioned to bring Black Planet into the next phase of its growth. Given BlackPlanet's history as a place for members to build their networks and fan bases around their passions for music and other interests, Wolfe will be able to leverage his understanding of the entertainment space to create a richer environment with enhanced features. He will also be charged with further developing Interactive One's media sites and advertising platform, and he will lead the conversion of Radio One's 53 station sites to create a holistic and consistent online presence across Radio One's multimedia operations.
"I am thrilled to join the Interactive One team and to further expand the opportunities for African-Americans to enrich their lives with a compelling online experience," said David Wolfe. "BlackPlanet and its sister sites have drawn an incredible number of users and we intend on continuing the tradition of creating innovative web products that add both value to existing users and strongly attract new users."
At Napster, Wolfe served as the Chief Technology Officer and as a Senior Vice President. Prior to Napster, Wolfe served as Reunion.com's President of Product & Technology for five years, during which he created a definitive product roadmap that positively engaged his team and helped drive the company from $4 million to over $50 million in revenues.
Many of the responsibilities that fall under this new position were previously handled by Ben Sun, the founder of Community Connect, the parent company of BlackPlanet and other niche social networking sites. Sun remains an important member of the Interactive One team, and as such, he will continue to serve as a strategic advisor to the Company.
About Interactive One
Interactive One has over 15 million members and reaches over 10 million monthly Black Americans each month. With approximately 8 billion annual page views on its suite of sites, the Company has the definitive social network for Black America, Blackplanet, as well as a number of leading content sites. These sites include: NewsOne (www.NewsOne.com), which provides up to the minute, comprehensive coverage of newsworthy events relevant to African Americans across the country and the world through syndicated news, original news reports, local content and opinion blogs from some of the most provocative minds in Black America.; TheUrbanDaily (www.TheUrbanDaily.com), which serves as the eyes and ears for African-Americans looking for a one-stop, comprehensive destination for entertainment news, information, gossip and opinion and original celebrity interviews; HelloBeautiful (www.HelloBeautiful.com), which celebrates the lives and style of African-American women with a dynamic daily mix of fashion, beauty, entertainment and relationship content and; Elev8 (www.Elev8.com) which a personal empowerment website dedicated to uplifting and enriching the lives of African-Americans by offering services, tools, information and community.
Interactive One was launched by Radio One in last year to complement Radio One's existing portfolio of media companies targeting the African-American community. Since its launch, Interactive One has quickly become the #1 online platform for the African American community. Interactive One is powered by the mission to create an online community that engages and positively impacts the lives of African Americans.
About Radio One
Radio One, Inc. (www.radio-one.com) is one of the nation's largest radio broadcasting companies and the largest radio broadcasting company that primarily targets African-American and urban listeners. Radio One owns and/or operates 52 radio stations located in 16 urban markets in the United States. Radio One also owns Magazine One, which publishes Giant Magazine (www.giantmag.com), interests in TV One (www.tvoneonline.com), a cable/satellite network programming primarily to African-Americans, Reach Media (www.blackamericaweb.com), owner of the Tom Joyner Morning Show and other businesses associated with Tom Joyner, and Interactive One. The company is led by Chairperson and Founder Catherine L. Hughes, and her son, Alfred Liggins, III, who is Chief Executive Officer and President.
Interactive One (Corporate Website)
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"I am very excited to have an executive of Tim's caliber join our team. Tim's marketing expertise, broad operational acumen and deep experience around the customer, make him uniquely qualified to lead us into the next phase of growth," said Roy Dunbar, CEO of Network Solutions. "Under Tim's leadership we will serve and delight a growing number of small businesses with best in class solutions for success on the internet. Tim's responsibilities will include Marketing, Product, Sales, and Customer Support."
"I am most impressed with Roy's vision for Network Solutions which is to be first in mind for new and existing small business owners seeking to get online as well as those looking to optimize and expand their online effectiveness," said Tim Kelly. "Most importantly, I see great opportunity for Network Solutions to become synonymous with small business success through initiatives like the ‘Small Business Success Index.'"
During a career with Sprint Corporation and Sprint/Nextel Corporation that spanned twelve years, Mr. Kelly made a number of important contributions to the company's success. In his most recent role as CMO, Mr. Kelly, led all of the organization's Marketing and Product initiatives. Prior to this role, he held the top post at several Sprint/Nextel Corporation and Sprint Corporation business units as President of Sprint Consumer Solutions President Sprint Business, President Sprint Mass Markets and President Customer Management. In his various executive roles at Sprint, Mr. Kelly was responsible for building the Sprint brand, defining and driving its customer acquisition and retention strategy, optimizing customer service and developing Sprint's product roadmap among other things.
His career at Sprint was interrupted in 1999, by a stint as President of Tickets.com, where he led the organization's domestic and international operations. Under Mr. Kelly's leadership, the company successfully executed a number of acquisitions and deployed a new business model which drove the company from a bricks and mortar ticketing software and distribution focus to an Internet based product and distribution strategy. His accomplishments included implementing new distribution and content partnerships with AOL Digital Cities, Excite, Cox Interactive Media, Yahoo, MP3, etc. He further refined the brand through innovative ticketing and sponsorship partnerships with top selling artists.
Mr. Kelly began his career in 1985 with Lever Brothers Household Products Division in New York. He made the transition into the advertising field where he managed national accounts for several top brands including Burger King, Arm and Hammer, Visine, Arm and Hammer Dental, Crest and Scope.
Mr. Kelly received his Bachelor of Science in Marketing from the University of Florida and his Master of Business Administration, Graduate Management Program, from Nova Southeast University.
About Network Solutions, LLC:
Network Solutions is focused on helping small businesses start and market their companies on the Internet by offering a full range of Web-based services that include: hosting, Web site design, ecommerce solutions, online security, search engine marketing and domain name registration services. Drawing on 30 years of experience, we make it simple and affordable for our customers to build and manage an online presence. Our customers receive the best customer service in the industry, which has been recognized by J.D. Power and Associates® Certified Call Center program for providing "An Outstanding Customer Service Experience" for the last four consecutive years. Customers around the globe trust us to manage more than 7 million domains, over 2 million e-mailboxes, and hundreds of thousands of Web sites. We make it easy for small businesses to get online so they can have more time to do what they do best - run their companies. For more information about Network Solutions visit www.about.networksolutions.com.
Network Solutions (Corporate Website)
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Former Disney Online VP and Co-Creator of Pirates of the Caribbean Online and ToonTown Online Heads Up Product Development
Boston, MA, March 17, 2009
Hangout Industries (www.hangout.net) today announced the appointment of Mike Goslin as Vice President Product Development. Goslin joins Hangout from Disney Online where he most recently served as vice president, virtual world design and development. At Hangout, Goslin will lead design, development and operations of the company's online entertainment product. Goslin will report to CEO Pano Anthos.
"I recognized the opportunity at Hangout to build a new form of online entertainment, one that combines the viral power of existing social networks with the rich immersion of online games and virtual worlds," said Mike Goslin. "Hangout represents a new level in brand-driven entertainment and I am thrilled to contribute to and deliver on that vision."
One of the most influential and successful technologists in the online games and virtual worlds industries, Goslin has more than 12 years of experience bringing high-profile, worldwide brands and franchises to life online and in theme parks. Goslin comes to Hangout from The Walt Disney Company where he was the driving force behind the development of online virtual worlds, games and communities for the company, including top-selling Pirates of the Caribbean Online and Toontown Online. As Disney's vice president virtual world design and development, he also led strategy and product development for community and social networking applications.
Hangout has been built from the ground up to be a great experience for non-technical users. Hangout runs on both PCs and Macs, supports all major operating systems and doesn't require special graphics cards. Users can not only customize their room but they can even build and modify objects in their rooms including completely altering the shape and style of furniture, and many other objects in a Hangout room. Hangout leverages cross platform, browser-based and Web 2.0 technologies that plug-in to larger social networks (Facebook, MySpace, etc) and Web content so that users never have to leave their profile pages to interact in their Hangout rooms.
"The progression of Hangout to a true entertainment experience from a technology platform is about to be realized," said Pano Anthos, CEO, Hangout Industries. "Mike is one of the most respected, effective and proven forces in the virtual worlds and games space. His combined talents as a natural story-teller, visionary and technologist make him the perfect candidate to bring Hangout to the forefront in the evolution of casual online entertainment."
During his tenure at Disney, Goslin was also vice president of Disney's VR Studio where he managed the company's virtual reality division and oversaw a highly talented team of 50+ programmers, artists and animators. He joined in 1996 and was instrumental in building the VR Studio into a leading theme park development studio and later reinventing the group as a studio for the design, development and operation of massively multiplayer online games.
Goslin's products are recognized worldwide and have received numerous awards and accolades including the 2005 WiredKids Safe Gaming Award, 2005 Webby Awards "Webby Worthy Selection", 2004 Game Industry News Family Game of the Year, 2003 Computer Gaming World MMORPG of the Year, 2003 Webby Awards People's Voice Award, The New York Times Top 10 Games of the Year 2003, and 2002 Outstanding Attraction from the Themed Entertainment Association.
About Hangout Industries
Based in Boston, MA and founded in 2007, Hangout Industries is developing Hangout.net, the world's first casual and immersive 3D social networking experience that leverages cross-platform, browser-based and Web 2.0 technologies while being seamlessly integrated into Facebook and MySpace. Allowing teens and young adults to create and customize their own virtual rooms featuring real brand-name products, Hangout.net provides a safe, secure, immersive and entertaining online environment for friends to hang out and have fun together. Hangout won "Best Use of Technology" from the MITX Interactive 2008 Annual Awards and was a 2008 TechCrunch50 finalist. Hangout is backed by funding from digital media-savvy venture capital firms Highland Capital Partners and Polaris Ventures. For more information, visit www.hangout.net.
Hangout Industries (Corporate Website)
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Most recently, Knight led the internal communications business for Ebay for the last two years. Prior to that, Knight was the VP of International Marketing for EBay, where he held that position for the previous seven years. Knight brings a wealth of branding experience to his most recent role at Cash 4 Gold having spent time at PepsiCo International as the Vice President of International Marketing for Gatorade as well as Quaker Oats. Early in his career Knight held various senior management roles at Frito-Lay where he was based in Sydney, Australia.
Cash4Gold was derived from Albar Precious Metal Refining, which was founded in 2001 with more than 60 years experience in the precious metals business. Since our inception we have grown into one of the largest and most respected precious metal refineries in the United States. We are the only refinery ever to be listed by the prestigious Inc. 500 Magazine for both 2006 and 2007 as one of the fastest growing 500 companies in America. Along with the accomplishment of reaching #129 in Inc. 500 Magazine, we have also achieved the ranking of #57 in Entrepreneur Magazine. Our final success comes from Forbes Magazine being awarded as one of the top companies to watch in 2008.
Cash4Gold (Corporate Website)
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Brandon Barber joins Zynga from Electronic Arts where he was the Senior Director of Global Online Marketing. Prior he was the Director of Entertainment Development and Programming at Electronic Arts, managing EA's branded entertainment activities across all TV, Web and digital mediums. Originally brought in to help establish EA's music marketing group, Barber had worked to broaden EA's entertainment footprint by working with an array of media and production partners on a broad range entertainment products based on EA franchises, such as the ESPN original series Madden Nation, NBA LIVE Bring It Home on ESPN and dozens of product-focused television shows and integrations.
Before his work at EA, Barber was the fifth employee at the original Napster, taking the service from 100k users to 100mm during his tenure and managing all aspects of the product experience and brand. Prior to that, he was a product manager and editorial contributor at Rollingstone.com and other Tunes.com properties. Barber holds a bachelor's degree from Marquette University and credentials in creative advertising from Northwestern University. Barber also co-authored a how-to manual on digital music called Sam's Teach Yourself E-Music Today, which was published by Macmillan USA in 2000.
Zynga (Corporate Website)
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Bigfoot Networks (Corporate Website)
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Jon joins GamerDNA from Nokia. Nokia acquired his former company Enpocket, a start-up company focused on mobile marketing, in October of 2007 . Jon's role at Nokia was Head of Eastern US Sales for the Nokia Interactive Advertising business unit. In his role he was responsible for building a sales team and managing Eastern US revenue in the emerging mobile advertising space.
Prior to Joining Enpocket in early 2005 Jon was at eBay and helped launch eBay's New York office. At eBay Jon was a Business Development manager in the Strategic Partnerships group overseeing relationships with significant eBay business partners and advertisers. Previous to that, he was at Fairmarket starting in early 1999 (acquired by eBay in 2003). FairMarket was a startup that created a commerce and promotional auction platform that Jon licensed to brand-name companies and agencies. During his tenure at Fairmarket, Jon experienced transition from early-stage startup, to a NASDAQ IPO, to an acquisition by eBay.
Jon holds a BA from Union College where he was a member of the varsity football for three years.
GamerDNA (Corporate Website)
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Hangout Industries (Corporate Website)
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enVIO networks, funded in 2006 by VCs Matrix Partners and North Bridge Venture partners, is focused on integrating social media, mobile and social networks to solve two key problems in mobile content - monetization and discovery.
Manish brings significant media and mobile industry experience from his recent role as CEO of Vantrix, and over 16 years at ESPN. This included a stint as SVP and GM of ESPN Mobile, which included content licensing and short-lived MVNO (Mobile ESPN) initiatives. More recently, he was CEO at Vantrix. All of this will be particularly crucial for a young company that has over $17 million in funding (via two rounds) and recently launched its platform. To date, the company has scored just a couple of operator deals, including Verizon Wireless and Bharti-Airtel, the latter covered in mediabistro's MobileMarketingToday "Bharti-Airtel Says Hello Tunes To envIO" post.
The idea of integrating social media, mobile and social networks makes sense from a discovery perspective, however, for me it will be about how the company can help on the monetization front, including ad-support.
enVIO (Corporate Website)
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"We're thrilled to bring these three outstanding leaders to the OnForce team," said CEO Peter Cannone. "OnForce has experienced enormous gains in the past year, despite these economic times. We now have nearly 14,000 professional service technicians across the US and Canada who have completed nearly 800,000 work orders on behalf of major VARs, staffing firms and solutions providers that use OnForce as their marketplace. By adding these three leaders, we are going to bring the OnForce message to even larger audiences and establish the infrastructure for further growth acceleration."
Cannone added, "We set out to broaden and deepen our leadership team in order to support our growth, and Maria, Ed and George each have the expertise to help lead OnForce as we help more buyers and providers of on-site services recognize and leverage the power of OnForce's marketplace."
Battaglia brings more than 15 years of experience in strategic branding, marketing and corporate communications for global technology and consumer brands. Battaglia joins OnForce from Weplay.com, where she headed marketing for the youth sports social networking company. She previously served as vice president of brand integration and partnerships at Monster.com and worked at NBC as a corporate vice president of communications and public affairs. Previously, Battaglia was in IBM's Internet Division and ran strategic communications for IBM's 1996 Atlanta Olympics Global Sponsorship.
McGovern has more than 20 years of sales experience. McGovern will lead OnForce's sales and business development and have overall responsibility for the company's revenue goals. He was most recently at EMC in their enterprise division, where he was responsible for sales groups delivering storage, software and professional services solutions. McGovern has also led sales organizations for Danka Office Imaging, Advent Software, Micro Warehouse and Xerox Corporation.
D'Errico has more than 15 years of alliance management, marketing and operations experience. He will oversee OnForce's training, community management and market support efforts. He served most recently as senior director of product management, purchasing & supply chain operations for PC Connection. D'Errico has also served as national sales manager of AirTouch Wireless.
About OnForce
OnForce is the leading marketplace for contract information technology (IT) and consumer electronics (CE) service professionals. The company enables VARs, service organizations and staffing companies to find skilled professionals in virtually every zip code in the US and Canada. These IT service firms turn to OnForce to expand their geographic and skill set coverage without adding overhead or upfront expenses. OnForce enables increased buyer control and reduced management costs, while
improving service levels and offering faster response times than traditional methods of
finding contract technicians.
Since its inception, the OnForce marketplace has been used to successfully complete more than 800,000 work orders. The OnForce community is made up of 5,000+ IT service buyers and nearly 14,000 IT service technicians who work in a number of technology categories, including computers, printers, networking, VoIP, point of sale and consumer electronics. For more information, visit www.onforce.com.
OnForce (Corporate Website)
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Yovanno spent nine years at Internet advertising network giant ValueClick, where he ended his tenure as chief operating officer of U.S. Media. He oversaw the company's display advertising, lead generation, and comparsion shopping business units. During the time he was there, ValueClick vetted more than 300 companies and bought 14. Before he joined ValueClick, Yovanno was a Navy lieutenant and chief information officer for a naval hospital.
Gigya's Wildfire platform lets more than 1,000 widget developers post and share their creations with a broader audience. And Gigya's Socialize platform provides any site with the tools it needs to incorporate social networking features, such as a newsfeed that tracks friend activity. Brands such as Disney and Kimberly-Clarky are using Gigya to reach consumers with branded widgets.
Gigya (Corporate Website)
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San Francisco, CA, October 21, 2008 - Kontera, the leading developer of In-Text Advertising & Information Solutions for web publishers and advertisers, announced today that Mr. Hal Muchnick has joined the company as President.
Hal joins Kontera after spending more than 20 years in senior management, operations and marketing positions at market leaders in the interactive digital advertising and marketing services industries.
In his most recent position, Hal served as Executive Vice President / General Manager at Operative, a global advertising resource management (ARM) platform provider, where he oversaw global sales and professional and client services in addition to his executive responsibilities as part of the Company's management team and Board of Directors.
Previously, Hal served as Vice President, Global Sales and Account Management for DoubleClick, where he was responsible for revenue and customer growth in the web publisher, interactive agency, and Rich Media segments. Prior to DoubleClick, Hal was Chief Operating Officer of LowerMyBills.com, where he was responsible for technology, product, sales and marketing. Hal spent over 10 years at Experian, which he helped evolve from a TRW operating unit into a stand-alone marketing information services company.
"Kontera is offering consumers, publishers and online marketers a range of innovative technology-enabled, user-focused In-Text media solutions. The recently launched Hybrid, which combines relevant consumer content and advertising, is an example of how Kontera delivers a great user experience for consumers, and high performing ad units for publishers and advertisers," (http://www.kontera.com/kontera-hybrid/) said Hal Muchnick, Kontera's newly appointed President. "This is an exciting time to join the company's dynamic management team and to serve as President of Kontera."
Kontera (Corporate Website)
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A digital media industry veteran, as well as one of the most recognized executives in the web media space; Mr. Day is one of the co-founders and was CEO of About.com. Most recently he served as Chief Media Officer of the global search engine marketing firm Marchex (NSDQ: MCHX). Mr. Day's digital media experience ranges back to his role as CEO of MeMedia, (formerly WhenU) the behavioral targeting firm and as a senior member of the Prodigy team, responsible for building many of the online services we find common today.
"Our Board of Directors, co-founder and CTO Steven Lee, and I have spent a lot of time interviewing candidates and meeting specifically with Bill during this process. His perceptiveness and deep knowledge of our ecosystem combined with his proven leadership abilities and experience make him a natural choice as CEO." said Mr. Lau. "People may not be aware that while at About.com, Bill actually started another company called Sprinks – an extremely hi-performing ad network that was eventually acquired by Google. This is testament to not just his energy but also to his understanding and breadth of experience in our industry. We're extremely pleased to name him CEO of ScanScout."
"ScanScout's technology is the draw here, not just for what they alone can do for advertisers and publishers today, but for how they have already thought ahead to the future and where targeting and video delivery are going across multiple platforms," said Mr. Day. "I see the kind of forward thinking at ScanScout that enabled About.com and Marchex to succeed. In every case, the value resides in how the company's technology solves problems now and anticipates them in the future. At the same time, our network is extremely well-positioned to continue its growth and to scale our business well beyond the more than 200M streams we're currently delivering every month."
About ScanScout
ScanScout is the market-leading online video advertising network. The company partners with major advertisers and publishers to maximize video advertising opportunities. ScanScout creates a new significant revenue stream for publishers, helping them to extract the most value out of their video content and monetize it in a user-friendly manner. For advertisers, ScanScout provides the ability to target, optimize and deliver ad messages to the right content and audience, maximizing user engagement. ScanScout is one of the largest online video networks on the web, serving hundreds of millions of ad impressions every month. The company is headquartered in Boston with offices in New York and Los Angeles. For more information, please visit: www.scanscout.com.
ScanScout (Corporate Website)
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"Mike is an exceptional match for Operative. He shares our conviction that customer satisfaction is critical to long-term success," says Mike Leo, CEO and president of Operative. "His prior experience as a leader in both digital advertising sales and enterprise software in both U.S. and international markets will help our company continue its tremendous rate of customer acquisition and ongoing leadership. We are thrilled to have him as part of the executive team."
Hard joins Operative from Microsoft where he spent over 17 years working in various sales leadership roles. Most recently, he served as vice president of U.S. digital advertising sales, charged with driving online media sales for Microsoft's digital properties and partnerships, and spearheading the transformation of its digital sales model. Prior to this position, Hard led several of Microsoft's most dynamic software sales organizations, founding the company's first vertical sales and services organization in financial services and running international sales subsidiaries in the Philippines and Latin America.
"Advertising's aggressive transition from traditional to digital is undeniable, and as a result, publishers need to streamline business processes across their digital properties," said Hard. "I'm thrilled about joining Operative and working with a world-class executive team. Operative's reputation as the industry's leading provider of ad management technology and services with a history of meeting the challenging needs of publishers now and in the future solidified my decision to help lead the company's customer and growth initiatives."
Operative recently announced partnerships with NBCU and National Public Media and appointed Vedant Sampath, a former Oracle software expert, as chief technology officer. These customer-wins and executive appointments represent Operative's noteworthy reputation in the digital ad space and success in helping the world's top publishers automate their digital ad management and operations business.
Operative (Corporate Website)
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Kenshoo (Corporate Website)
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Before joining Pure Digital, Stewart spent two years as the President of Philips Consumer Electronics, North America, the Atlanta-based company serving the North American consumer electronics market for the $34.9 billion global electronics leader, Philips Electronics. Mr. Muller joined Philips in June of 2006, bringing 17 years of technology sector experience in strategic marketing, sales and general management in the retail and business-to-business sectors.
Prior to joining Philips, Mr. Muller spent nine years with Olympus America's Consumer Products Group, most recently as Executive Vice President of Olympus Imaging America. In his various assignments within Olympus, he developed a deep knowledge of national consumer electronics retailers and how to drive dramatic growth in a competitive industry. Mr. Muller also previously held managerial positions within Apple Computer for eight years, leaving the company with the title of National Sales Manager, U.S. Retail. During his years at Apple, Mr. Muller learned the importance of design and how to humanize technology for the consumer.
Pure Digital is based in San Francisco and backed by Sequoia Capital, Benchmark Capital, and Steamboat Ventures.
Pure Digital Technologies (Corporate Website)
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"We are extremely pleased that Chris Marrow is joining the Aggregate Knowledge executive leadership team. Chris has a 15-year proven track record of driving advertising growth and revenue and has deep experience in ad targeting and sales," said Paul Martino, Aggregate Knowledge CEO and founder. "Chris will drive our momentum with Discovery Ads and provide our customers with an entirely new way to get their brand discovered by new audiences."
Prior to joining Aggregate Knowledge, Marrow was vice president of western ad sales for TACODA, Inc., which was acquired by AOL in July 2007. At TACODA, Marrow was a key executive that set the standard for behavioral targeting advertising. While at TACODA, Marrow led the western US sales team and helped double sales revenue for three consecutive years. He also served a strategic role in marketing, product management and business development. Prior to TACODA, Marrow served in a business development leadership role at eBay. He also led sales for AltaVista, Digital Envoy, Respond.com, Flycast, and Engage Technologies. Marrow also served in marketing and sales for Ziff Davis Inc. and Softbank Interactive. Marrow holds a BA in business administration from the University of California.
"I am excited to join Aggregate Knowledge and drive growth and revenue with their innovative Discovery Ad offers," said Marrow. "Pique™ Discovery Ads fill a huge gap for advertisers who are looking to mix the best of brand and direct response advertising and I look forward to delivering this offer to the world's biggest brands and advertisers."
Aggregate Knowledge (Corporate Website)
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TheLadders.com (Corporate Website)
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New Management Structure Aimed at Delivering and Innovating Products and Services for Distribution to Partners, and to Web at Large
Announces Expansion of Local Media Network and Customer Solutions Team Saint Paul, MN and New York, NY - February 26, 2008 - Internet Broadcasting, a leader in local internet audience aggregation and advertising, announced today that it has appointed online veterans, Jeff Kimball, as Chief Operating Officer, and Tony Dunaif, as GM/Local Media Network, to its Management team.
Tony Dunaif as GM of Local Media Networks
Media and business development executive Tony Dunaif joins IB as GM of the newly created Local Media Network, and will be responsible for building and growing major external relationships across the broadcast stations and groups, CNN and expanding to develop new distribution partnerships. Additionally, Tony will work with the Customer Solutions team in their delivery of solutions to partners and advertisers. Tony will be based out of New York, NY, reporting directly to David Lebow.
Most recently, Tony was Vice President, Content Partnerships and International Development at Brightcove - the leading Internet TV platform that enables content owners to create, publish and monetize broadband channels. In this capacity, he was responsible for closing business agreements with leading media companies, both domestically and abroad. Prior to Brightcove, Tony held several senior posts throughout his 12 year tenure at MTV Networks. As Senior Vice President of Business Development, he successfully created new businesses, revenue streams and strategic plans that supported and enhanced the MTV brand. He also played a key role in developing Broadband, Gaming, Mobile, Satellite Radio, Hispanic Media, Video on Demand, and HDTV initiatives.
"IB is undergoing a fundamental transformation, and we're organizing our management team around aggressive goals for the Company and our customers. I'm delighted to have Jeff Kimball and Tony Dunaif join our pursuit of making local work on the Internet," said David Lebow, President and CEO of Internet Broadcasting. "We are committed to innovating for the next era of the Internet by investing in our relationships with publishers, advertisers and web consumers. We're equally committed to becoming more relevant for our TV partners by providing tools and services at scale that will help them achieve local Internet ubiquity. With the addition of Jeff and Tony to our team, we have the skills and expertise to make our vision a reality."
Internet Broadcasting (Corporate Website)
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Grayson, a principal at Viximo backer North Bridge Venture Partners, had served as CEO since the company replaced former CEO Rob Frasca in April. She will retain a board seat at the company, Strang said.
Strang, a New Hampshire native, was at IGN for three years starting in 2005, while the company, known for its online reviews of new video games, added digital game distribution. He said online publishers of all descriptions are learning from the gaming industry's embrace of digital-goods commerce.
Founded in 2007 by Brian Balfour and Sean Lindsay, Viximo provides white-label virtual goods selling software for media publishers, including micro-payments, virtual currency, analytics and virtual-goods content.
"It's the opportunity for web publishers to build a direct consumer revenue stream," Strang said. "Large social networks that aren't in that business yet, but they have large audiences that are highly interactive. That's a perfect use case. They're looking for ways to really get into this exploding market."
Viximo reports customers of its white-label software product include 24 web publishers, reaching an aggregate usership of 60 million each month. The company has also developed virtual goods for sale on its network for more than 40 brands, it reports.
Immediately prior to joining Viximo, Strang was briefly president and co-founder of the San Francisco-based ad network startup 5to1.com. He said the company's founders, including former AOL executive Michael Barrett, never intended to take full-time roles with 5to1. Barrett is now CEO of online ad optimizer AdMeld. He said he and Barrett will retain advisory roles with 5to1. Barrett still holds the chairman's seat on 5to1's board, according to the company's website.
Before IGN, Strang was vice president and publisher at Ziff Davis Media for eight years.
Viximo (Corporate Website)
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Former CEO of Organic to lead company into next phase of its evolution
SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., April 22, 2008 - Linden Lab®, the developer of the 3D virtual world Second Life®, today announced that its board of directors has named Mark Kingdon to serve as chief executive officer. In his new role, Kingdon will lead the day-to-day management and operations of the company, working closely alongside Linden Lab founder, former CEO and current chairman Philip Rosedale.
Since 2001, prior to joining Linden Lab, Kingdon served as chief executive officer of Organic Inc., a leading digital communications agency, establishing its reputation as a groundbreaking, innovative provider of user-centered design. Prior to Organic, Kingdon worked with idealab!, providing strategic guidance and operational support to emerging companies. Before that, Kingdon was a partner with the consulting division of PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP (PwC), where he held a variety of senior roles throughout his twelve-year tenure. He received an MBA from the Wharton School of Business and a BA in Economics from UCLA.
"Our search for the leader of Linden Lab demanded both tremendous business skills and a deep understanding and passion for Second Life and where it is going. Mark is the perfect choice," said Philip Rosedale, founder and chairman of the board, Linden Lab. "His management style, unwavering leadership in the face of great challenges, and approach to team-building exactly matches Linden's needs. He is a passionate believer in the potential of virtual worlds to change the world, and I look forward to working by his side while we watch it happen."
"We wanted to find someone with an exceptional blend of strategic, analytic, business and leadership skills, but also with endless creativity and a passion for the company and growing the virtual worlds category," said Mitch Kapor, founder of Lotus Development Corporation and a Linden Lab board member. "Mark has demonstrated all of these attributes throughout his career, particularly at Organic, which, like Linden Lab, puts an incredible emphasis on overall user experience and design."
"Joining Linden Lab at this moment in its evolution, with so much growth and opportunity on the horizon, is incredibly exciting and I look forward to working with Philip and the Linden Lab team to help Second Life realize its limitless potential," said Mark Kingdon, Chief Executive Officer, Linden Lab. "To me, the CEO role at Linden Lab combines perfectly my passions for art and design, business and technology. Until Second Life, we experienced the digital world passively in two dimensions. By enabling users to create a rich and immersive virtual world, Second Life is transforming the way we connect, collaborate, learn and transact online. I am thrilled to be part of this epic transformation."
LindenLab/SecondLife (Corporate Website)
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Mr. Taptich joins Songbird with more than 15 years experience in the digital media and entertainment industry spanning multiple disciplines including finance, general management, marketing and business development. Taptich most recently served as VP Business Development at BITTORRENT INC., the world's leading peer-assisted content delivery and platform company. Prior to BITTORRENT, Taptich spent 2 years as Director Online Business Development and Marketing at Electronic Arts where he was instrumental in developing key online partnerships with companies including Google, Yahoo, and Fox.
Songbird is based in San Francisco and backed by Sequoia Capital and Atlas Ventures.
Songbird (Corporate Website)
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New Management Structure Aimed at Delivering and Innovating Products and Services for Distribution to Partners, and to Web at Large
Announces Expansion of Local Media Network and Customer Solutions Team Saint Paul, MN and New York, NY - February 26, 2008 - Internet Broadcasting, a leader in local internet audience aggregation and advertising, announced today that it has appointed online veterans, Jeff Kimball, as Chief Operating Officer, and Tony Dunaif, as GM/Local Media Network, to its Management team.
Jeff Kimball as Chief Operating Officer
Internet and technology industry executive Jeff Kimball brings to IB more than twenty years of experience building, growing and operating successful Internet and start-up companies. With specific experience running Product Marketing, Program Management, Design, Operations, Technology and QA teams, Jeff will be responsible for all aspects of customer solutions and product delivery. In this capacity, Jeff will approach the objective of winning in local by developing innovative tools, web products and services that empower publishers to create large web audiences and to serve advertisers at scale. Jeff will be based out of St. Paul, MN and will report directly to David Lebow, the Company's President and Chief Executive Officer.
Most recently, Jeff was Senior Vice President of Product Development at Vive Computing (formerly NHC Systems, Inc.) where he was responsible for delivering complete solutions - product and technology - to help Vive fundamentally alter the way consumers and small businesses purchased, used and received support for computers. Prior to Vive, Jeff spent 11 years at AOL where he held a numerous positions developing at-scale customer, advertiser, and publishing solutions. At AOL Jeff led the business and product planning for more than 10 major releases of the AOL service; he was responsible for the product direction and delivery for the most successful consumer facing products AOL ever produced (including AOL.com, e-mail, instant messaging, search, parental controls). In addition to his work domestically, Jeff also led the unified European product and technology strategy - managing teams in London, Hamburg, Paris, Dublin, Luxembourg, California and Virginia.
Internet Broadcasting (Corporate Website)
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Founded in 2005, Yodle makes buying online ads simple and easy for small businesses and offers a high-performing, affordable alternative to the outdated Yellow Pages, previously the standard for small business advertising.
"Yodle's strong position in this rapidly growing industry requires an experienced, entrepreneurial and aggressive leader for our sales group. We have found that person in Mike, and he will play a key role in driving continued dramatic growth for Yodle," said Yodle CEO Court Cunningham.
At Yahoo! HotJobs, DeLuca was responsible for leading Direct and Channel Sales for North America, and grew the organization's year-over-year Search and Display media revenue exponentially over the past several years. Prior to his time at Yahoo!, DeLuca led sales teams at EMC, StorageApps and Hewlett Packard. He was part of a 5-member executive team that sold StorageApps to HP in 2001.
"I am excited to join Yodle at such a key point in the evolution of the company. With a great product and even stronger sales organization, Yodle has the momentum to complete its drive to industry leadership," said DeLuca.
Yodle's unique approach to simplifying online advertising for local businesses has driven 400% growth in the fourth quarter 2007 vs. fourth quarter 2006. The company currently has hundreds of employees helping thousands of customers across the United States.
About Yodle, Inc.
Yodle provides local businesses with a simple and affordable way to get new customers and phone calls using online advertising. Yodle, a company funded by Bessemer Venture Partners and Draper Fisher Jurvetson, is transforming local online advertising by connecting local business owners with consumers in a simple, measurable and relevant way. Yodle has developed an integrated approach to signing up and serving local businesses that are transitioning their marketing budgets online. Yodle is headquartered in New York, NY with a presence in 18 major cities across the United States and has hundreds of employees helping thousands of customers. To find out more about Yodle, go to http://www.yodle.com
Yodle (Corporate Website)
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Mr. Mitchell said, "The Board of Directors and I are very pleased that Roy is joining Network Solutions to lead our long-term growth. It was clear to us that bringing an executive of Roy's talent and experience to Network Solutions at a time when our business is strong and we are successfully executing our growth strategies will help propel Network Solutions on its growth trajectory. He has proven leadership experience and expertise in technology and sales. I look forward to this new chapter in the history of our Company, and to working with Roy and the Board to build on our significant accomplishments."
Mr. Dunbar said, "I am very excited to join Network Solutions. Under Champ's leadership, the Company has had tremendous success and positioned itself to continue to be a leader in helping small businesses establish and market their companies online. I am looking forward to working with Champ and the Company's talented management team to build on this strong franchise and capture the very attractive growth opportunities we see ahead for Network Solutions."
Mr. Dunbar, 46, joined MasterCard Incorporated in September 2004. As President of Global Technology and Operations, he was a member of the Executive Committee reporting to the Chief Executive Officer. He led a significant number of employees driving technology that processed approximately 16 billion transactions, clearing $2 trillion per year and representing 73% of the company's annual revenue in 2006.
Previously, Mr. Dunbar was with Eli Lilly and Company for 14 years, serving as President, Intercontinental Region, and as Chief Information Officer. As Lilly's President, Intercontinental Region, he was responsible for all operations in the world's fastest growing economies - Brazil, Russia, India and China. Mr. Dunbar had served as Lilly's Vice President and Chief Information Officer from 1999 to 2003, and is credited with having led Lilly to rank as the most innovative user of technology in the pharmaceutical industry.
Mr. Dunbar currently serves as a director of EDS Corporation and as a director of Humana Inc. He is also a member of the board of the Executive Leadership Council Foundation, an organization supporting the development of African American corporate leaders.
Network Solutions (Corporate Website)
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Mr. Weingartner joins RED 5 with over 20 years experience in software development and engineering. Weingartner most recently served as VP Server Technology at Oracle where he led the worldwide engineering efforts for the SOA Suite product set. Prior to Oracle, Weingartner served as VP Engineering at Talking Blocks through it's acquisition by HP, where he stayed on to lead the worldwide R&D Enablement team, a 500+ person organization. Before this, Weingartner spent 3 years as VP Engineering at Siebel systems, a CRM solutions leader acquired by Oracle in 2005.
RED 5 STUDIOS is based in Aliso Viejo, CA., and backed by Benchmark Capital and Sierra Ventures.
Red 5 Studios (Corporate Website)
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CCP Games (Corporate Website)
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"Mark's background in building successful online consumer media businesses makes him the ideal person to lead VUDU as we set out to revolutionize the home viewing experience," said Alain Rossman, VUDU Chairman and co-founder. "I'm confident that Mark's insight and drive will propel VUDU to living rooms around the country, and I'm very excited to have him join our team."
Jung comes to VUDU with 20 years of leadership in the technology industry with the last several years deep in the convergence of media and technology. He was the co-founder and CEO of IGN Entertainment, a leading Internet media and services company for video gaming and other forms of digital entertainment. Founded in 1999, Mark led IGN from a small start-up to an entertainment powerhouse with millions of users and a strong subscription business. In October 2005, Mark led IGN's sale to News Corp., the parent company of Fox Interactive Media.
Subsequent to the acquisition, Jung served as Chief Operating Officer of Fox Interactive Media where he was responsible for all of its Internet properties including MySpace, IGN Entertainment, FoxSports.com, AmericanIdol.com, and Scout Media.
Jung was also co-founder and CEO of Worldtalk Corporation, an Internet security company that he took public in 1996 and that has since merged with Tumbleweed Communications. "I'm very excited to be given the opportunity play a key role in delivering the highest quality digital entertainment directly to the living room," said Mark Jung. "VUDU's cutting edge innovation and growth trajectory in the video-on-demand category make it well positioned to win in this marketplace. I'm looking forward to helping accelerate the company's success." Jung holds an MBA from Stanford Business School and a B.S. from Princeton University.
Vudu (Corporate Website)
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Lime Light Networks (Corporate Website)
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Lab256 (Corporate Website)
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Popular Media (Corporate Website)
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Data Robotics (Corporate Website)
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EZPrints (Corporate Website)
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Reuters (Corporate Website)
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TotalMove (Corporate Website)
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TheLadders.com (Corporate Website)
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Reuters (Corporate Website)
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Vivox (Corporate Website)
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