Programmatic marketing intelligence and multi-platform media trading company The Exchange Lab has named digital media veteran Neil Houston as its operations director in Canada.
Houston has more than 15 years of digital media and ad operations experience, most recently at Shaw Media, where he set up and managed the company’s digital ad systems infrastructure. He is also the current co-chair of the IAB Ad Operations Committee.
“He is a fixture in the Canadian digital media scene and will bring his incredible experience from Shaw and industry knowledge from the IAB to build out operations in this market and contribute to the ongoing development of our market-leading technology,” said Exchange Lab CEO James Aitken in a release.
The hire comes amid an “aggressive” global expansion plan by Exchange Lab, which launched in the United Kingdom in 2007 and subsequently added offices in Toronto and Istanbul.
The company also announced that it is expanding into the U.S. with the opening of two offices in New York and San Francisco. It has also named Mark Charkin, former executive vice-president of advertising and global business development for King (creators of the mobile game Candy Crush Saga), as chief revenue officer, responsible for growing global revenue and overseeing commercial development.
King cemented its reputation as a global leader in the casual gaming space during Charkin’s tenure, growing from 10 million to more than 200 million monthly players and increasing advertising revenues by more than 1,000%. He has also worked with the social networking site Bebo and served as an executive consultant at companies including Endemol and BrightRoll.
