The mobile marketing industry is ever-changing, and that applies to the people as much as the technology. Movers & Shakers is our regular feature following the hottest hires in the industry, so you can keep track of who’s joined which company, and what they’re doing there.

Hyundai selects Zepeda as marketing head
Angela Zepeda has been hired as chief marketing officer at Hyundai Motor America. Reporting to Hyundai Motor America chief operating officer Brian Smith, she will be responsible for all of Hyundais marketing and advertising activities in the US, including the strategic direction, brand development, national and regional advertising, experiential marketing, digital and social media, brand partnerships, and lead generation, among other responsibilities.

Zepeda arrives at Hyundai with more than 25 years of experience. Most recently, she was senior vice president and managing director at Hyundai’s agency of record Innocean USA, where she handled all operations for the Hyundai business including creative, planning, and media operations. She was initially hired by the agency to head up business development.

Before Innocean, Zepeda was chief executive officer of Quigley-Simpson and, prior to that, CMO at Campbell Ewald-Los Angeles. She has also worked at agencies including TBWA\Chiat\Day, Team One, Rapp, Doner, and FCB.

“Its a great honour to be going in-house at Hyundai and Im excited by the challenge of leading the marketing team during this transitional time for the automotive industry,” said Zepeda. “Hyundai is a brand on an upward trajectory with sales growth that outpaces the industry, a revamped product line up, and a laser focus on the customer experience. Im looking forward to getting started and building upon the marketing departments recent successes and accomplishments.”

Richter named chair of board at IAB Tech Lab
The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Tech Lab has elected SpotX chief scientist Neal Richter as chair of its board of directors. He will play a key role in guiding the Tech Lab’s work to evolve privacy-compliant standards for programmatic advertising, simplify video ad delivery, increase supply chain transparency, and reduce fraud, among other initiatives.

Richter has more than 20 years of experience leading software teams and developing data-driven products. As co-chair of Tech Lab’s OpenRTB Working Group, he has helped the development of the OpenRTB protocol.

“It is an absolute honour to be elected chair of Tech Lab’s board of directors,” Richter said. “Having spent the past eight years collaborating with other members on standards like OpenRTB, I know how important our work is in building a better digital supply chain. I can’t wait to take an even larger role in driving the agenda and creating guidance and technology that supports the growth of video, audio, and other content and services worldwide.”

The IAB Tech Lab board also elected Eric Picard, Pandora’s vice president of advertising product management, to join its six-member executive committee.

The Ozone Project hires three
Bryan Scott has joined digital advertising marketplace The Ozone Project as marketing communications director, while Lucille Brune has taken the position of head of trading and Karen Ritchie as head of account management.

Reporting to chief executive officer Damon Reeve, Scott will lead the development and execution of the marketing, communications and event strategy. He has held positions at Capital Radio, DGMT and, most recently, Primesight, where he led the marketing team through the company’s acquisition by Global.

Brune, reporting to Ozone Audience managing director Craig Tuck, will focus on implementing campaign optimisation strategies specifically tailored to drive revenue growth and improve the advertiser experience. She joins from Captify, where she was trading director, working across Havas, Publicis, OMD, Aegis Media and independent agencies.

Ritchie arrives at The Ozone Project from STAQ. She will report to director of business development Dipti Patel and will focus on creating a streamlined approach to the on-boarding process for publisher partnerships, while identifying opportunities for publishers to grow their digital advertising revenue.

“As we complete our first year, The Ozone Project has made significant progress in delivering real scale for brands reaching engaged audiences in brand-safe and quality environments,” said Reeve. “By generating real business results for advertisers, we are closing the digital gap between brands and publishers and improving value for both. Delivering these results for advertisers are a wonderful and dynamic team, and we’re delighted that Lucille, Bryan and Karen are joining as we build the digital advertising environment of the future for brands and publishers.”

Flohr heads to Fox to lead on tech
Fox Corporation has recruited Yoel Flohr as executive vice president of technology & digital. Reporting to chief technology officer and president of digital Paul Cheesbrough, he will lead the digital product portfolio for Fox Entertainment.

Flohr will oversee digital products and relationships, including Fox Now, and will work closely with the Fox Entertainment team to develop and grow new digital businesses, partnerships and revenues.

He previously served as EVP of digital and franchise development for AMC Networks and Studios, where he oversaw its digital business. At AMC, Flohr promoted the development of global franchises like The Walking Dead, Fear the Walking Dead and The Terror and ran the TV Everywhere business for all of AMC’s brands. Prior to AMC, he co-founded Thirty Labs and, earlier, founded Ventuation following his time as VP of digital at Shine Group.

“Yoel is the ideal leader to propel Fox Entertainment’s multi-platform and product management initiatives and partnerships,” commented Cheesbrough. “I am delighted to welcome him to the team and look forward to working together to build and grow our digital capabilities and revenue streams.”

Blackberry expands executive team with promotions
John McClurg has been promoted to chief information security officer and Christopher Hummel to chief information officer at Blackberry. Reporting to executive chairman and chief executive officer John Chen, both will begin their new roles on 26 October.

McClurg is currently Blackberry Cylance’s vice president, where he joined from a role as Dell’s chief security officer in 2016. AS CISO, he will lead all aspects of BlackBerry’s information security program globally, ensuring the development and implementation of cybersecurity policies and procedures across all divisions and corporate functions. McClurg will be responsible for identifying, evaluating and reporting on information security risks to the executive team, and serve as a company evangelist of best practices in cybersecurity.

Prior to working at Dell, he held senior positions at Honeywell International, Lucent Technologies/Bell Laboratories, the US Intelligence Community, the Department of Energy, the FBI, and the CIA.

Hummel, who is currently Blackberry’s vice president of IT and business application solutions, will serve as a transformational leader within BlackBerry, responsible for providing insights to the executive leadership on key technological innovations, ensuring IT considerations drive key initiatives across the company, and maintaining the highest level of enterprise security and employee privacy.

Hummel brings over 20 years of IT leadership experience to the role including service delivery, project management, network integration, and new business development across international locations. He joined Blackberry in 2012.

“These promotions recognise the impact of John and Christopher’s outstanding leadership in their respective roles,” Chen said. “With their skills and expertise, they will continue to work closely with me and the rest of the executive team to ensure continuity and growth across our business.”

Gott gets analytics practice lead role at Merkle
Merkle, a Dentsu Aegis Network agency, has promoted Ben Gott to the role of EMEA analytics practice leader. Reporting directly to Merkle EMEA president Michael Komasinski, his new role responds to the increasingly sophisticated and fast changing data and technology landscape, and sees the existing analytics teams from Merkle’s performance media agency and customer analytics business across EMEA brought together.

Gott, who was previously senior vice president of analytics & strategy, was director of analytics at Periscopix when it was acquired by Merkle in 2015.

“We have created several exciting analytical service offerings with clear value adds for Merkle and its clients,” said Gott. “I look forward to working with the incredible talent we have to make Merkle Analytics a unique and scaled proposition in EMEA. My vision is that this unit will drive Merkle’s solution development and elevate the Dentsu Aegis Network’s data, tech and analytics capabilities.”

Adform chooses Acton to lead UK team
Phil Acton has been appointed UK country manager at ad tech firm Adform. He will be responsible for further expanding Adform’s vision of an integrated advertising platform, drawing on his expertise in sales, new business development and account management to head up the UK team.

Acton will also cultivate and develop new and existing client relationships, as well as build on partnerships with brands, media and creative agencies.

He brings over 20 years of experience into the role including seven years at Adobe and 15 years in advertising and marketing software sales across the UK and EMEA.

Berman hired to take charge of comms at LivePerson
LivePerson, a conversational commerce solutions provider, has named Craig Berman as its senior vice president of global communications. He will lead the company’s internal and external communications strategy.

Most recently, Berman led public relations for Amazon Entertainment. Before that, he advised Jeff Bezos on corporate and crisis communications, led consumer public relations for Amazon’s retail business, and spearheaded communications for Amazon’s fulfilment network.

Prior to Amazon, Berman held leadership positions at MWWPR and worked in politics running and advising congressional and legislative campaigns. He began his career working for his home Congressman, John Kasich.

“LivePerson’s vision for conversational commerce is no less than a complete reimagining of how consumers experience their day-to-day interactions with brands,” said Berman. “Im thrilled to join LivePerson’s team of experts to tell the stories of how the brands we work with are changing the lives of their customers for the better.”

Avantgarde adds creative team of Cox and Terzic
Zander Cox and Marty Terzic have joined brand experience agency Avantgarde London as creative copywriter and art director respectively.

Both join Avantgarde from DDB, and previously worked together at FCB Inferno and Saatchi & Saatchi across clients including BMW, Oreo, Visa, HSBC, Mercedes-Benz, Betway, and Huawei.

The team’s responsibilities at Avantgarde centre on idea generation and development, focusing primarily on new business opportunities.

“Story has always been at the heart of everything Marty and I do, and in turn, it lies at the heart of everything that we work on,” said Cox. “We always strive to bring these stories to people in a way that means they can be immersed and active within them. We’re not talking to them, but talking with them, allowing us to shape the story together.”

Terzic added: “Avantgarde gives Zander and I the platform to create full immersive experiences that have storytelling at the heart of every project, giving people the opportunity to not just hear about the story, but to actually live it.”

Board and C-suite bolstered at Brandwatch
Digital consumer intelligence firm Brandwatch has introduced new board and executive team members. Guy Berruyer joins as chairman of the board, with Fergus Gloster taking his place as a non-executive director. Meanwhile, Eva Klein arrives as chief customer officer and Dan Freund as chief sales officer, joining Ian Collins, who joined earlier this year as chief financial officer.

Berruyer is currently also chairman of the board at Softomotive. He, most notably, served as chief executive officer at Sage for 17 years.

Gloster has the non-executive director role at Teamwork.com, Condeco, and Brightpearl alongside his new gig with Brandwatch. He was one of the founders of Salesforces European commercial presence and led Marketos European growth for over four years.

Klein, most recently, led customer success at Hubspot. She also led teams at Constant Contact, Invoca, Enservio and FatWallet.

Freund arrives from the role of chief sales officer at QuickBase. Prior to this, Freund worked at Oracle for more than 16 years.

Collins was global finance director at Christie’s, finance director at Twentieth Century Fox, chief financial officer at Marv Films, and had 10 years in senior finance roles at EMI.

“This next chapter for Brandwatch will see more growth and an expansion of our offerings in digital consumer intelligence,” said Giles Palmer, CEO of Brandwatch. “Weve hired executives and non-executives who are capable of running a company many times our size. Its an ambitious move and the best team Ive ever worked with. I feel privileged to lead them, and Im excited to see what we can build to help our customers be more successful.”