Turn Elevates Bill Demas to CEO
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Industry Veteran Bill Demas Promoted to CEO to Continue Rapid Growth; Jim
Barnett Continues as Chairman
REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Sept. 10 /PRNewswire/ -- Turn Inc., the smart platform
for digital advertising, today announced it has elevated president and chief
operating officer Bill Demas to the position of chief executive officer as
part of the company's long-term succession plan. Jim Barnett, the company's
co-founder and CEO who has led the company since its inception, will continue
as Chairman.
(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20090910/SF73263LOGO)
Demas has been involved with Turn since 2007 when he became part of the board
of directors. In December 2008, he joined the executive team as a strategic
addition to the company's operational leadership. He was responsible for
overseeing Turn's platform solutions group, sales, publisher development,
business operations and client services functions.
The Turn platform delivers precision audiences, exceptional performance, and
powerful insights through two sources - the exchange trading desks and private
networks of global agencies and premium advertisers, and the Turn Network.
Over the past year, Turn has seen accelerated adoption of its exchange trading
desk product, which powers next generation media buying and optimization for
ad agencies and large advertisers. Turn's ad network has also grown
tremendously and was recently recognized by comScore as the fastest growing ad
network.
"Bill has been an exceptional leader and trusted colleague for many years, and
has played a critical role in Turn's remarkable growth. I can't think of
anyone more qualified and better suited to take over as CEO of Turn as we
continue our rapid growth," said Barnett. "Our vision for Turn was in synch on
both sides of the boardroom, and I'm passing the reins knowing that the
company is in extraordinarily good hands with Bill."
"Jim's tremendous hard work, vision and leadership skills are what brought
Turn from a concept to where it is right now - one of the largest and fastest
growing online ad networks, and a strategic technology provider for some of
the ad industry's top interactive agencies," said Demas. "I'm excited to be
taking over as Turn's CEO when the company is primed to have a direct and
measurable impact on the way ad agencies identify audiences and buy online
media."
"This is the natural and planned evolution we anticipated when Jim brought
Bill on board," said Jeff Crowe, general partner, Norwest Venture Partners,
who serves on Turn's board. "From our perspective, the face of our leader
might have changed, but our mission is still the same - leveraging Turn's deep
technology experience to deliver the right audiences, actionable results and
excellent client service to agencies and brands."
Demas brings more than 20 years of successful leadership and operations
experience to his new role as CEO. Demas crystallized his advertising
industry experience working at Yahoo!/Overture, leading the company's
multi-billion dollar distribution network for search marketing. As head of the
Yahoo! Publisher Network Group, Demas oversaw business development, product
management, marketing, and professional services, building hundreds of
exclusive distribution relationships with major Internet sites and publishers.
Prior to the acquisition by Yahoo! in 2003, Demas was part of the senior team
that guided Overture to revenues of one billion dollars.
Prior to joining Turn, Demas was the president and CEO of MokaFive, a next
generation desktop virtualization company. Before his time at Overture, he
served as executive vice president at Vividence Corporation (acquired by
Keynote), overseeing all aspects of product development and marketing.
Previously he held senior consumer product and enterprise business roles at
Microsoft including its Encarta Encyclopedia and SQL Server lines. Demas
began his career at IBM in technology sales.
In addition to sitting on Turn's Board of Directors, Demas serves on the Board
of Directors of Advocates for Children (CASA of San Mateo County) and the
advisory boards of DeviceVM and Digital Performance. Demas earned an MBA from
Harvard Graduate School of Business, and bachelor degrees in computer science
and organizational behavior & management from Brown University.
About Turn Inc.
Turn is the smart platform for digital advertising. Through its advanced
platform, Turn delivers precision audiences, exceptional performance and
powerful insights to global agencies and premium advertisers. Turn combines
predictive targeting, custom behavioral modeling, and powerful analytics to
power the rapidly growing Turn network, as well as the exchange trading desks
and private networks of leading global agencies. Turn is a leader in digital
advertising, serving targeted advertising to over 150 million domestic unique
users. The company is headquartered in Silicon Valley, California and has
offices in New York City, Chicago and San Francisco. For more information,
visit http://www.turn.com.
For more information contact:
Chris Kermoian Diane Schreiber
Turn Inc. Sparkpr for Turn
(650) 353-4378 (415) 321-1871
chris.kermoian@turn.com diane@sparkpr.com
SOURCE Turn Inc.
Chris Kermoian of Turn Inc., +1-650-353-4378, chris.kermoian@turn.com; or
Diane Schreiber of Sparkpr, +1-415-321-1871, diane@sparkpr.com, for Turn Inc.
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