On the back of continued growth, Howorth has appointed three new employees across its specialist practices. Robin Clark joins in the position of account director in the technology team, Tegan Knight in the position of account manager in the consumer and lifestyle team, and Steven Reilly in the position of senior account manager in the corporate and business-to-business team.

Howorth’s managing director, Graham White, said: “Howorth experienced a record year in 2010 and we’ve seen continued growth and momentum in 2011, adding a number of new clients and further organic growth within our existing portfolio. As a result, we’ve had to further expand the teams and we’re delighted with the new talent coming into the agency.”

Clark (pictured left) is relocating to Sydney from Weber Shandwick, London, where he has spent eight years working his way through to the position of account director, leading a number of international technology and corporate accounts including Capgemini, Microsoft Research, Microsoft EMEA and Monster Europe. Clark’s first role in PR was at Apple in 2002, when he was offered a role as a PR assistant following a successful internship. At Howorth, Clark will be working on clients that include Telstra, Intel and Hitachi Data Systems.

Reilly (pictured middle) joins from the Sydney Opera House where he has been working as a communications specialist for the past five years. Two key highlights include the Oprah Winfrey Show with Tourism Australia and the YouTube Symphony Orchestra with Google, which gained 33 million viewers, overtaking U2 as the most viewed live performance on YouTube. Other key events included APEC Australia and the FIFA World Congress.

Reilly started his career in his native Scotland and prior to coming to Australia held communications roles at organisations including the UK Film Council, Scottish Screen and marketing agency 2Fluid Creative, At Howorth, he will be supporting the management and growth of Howorth’s B2B/Corporate practice, working on a range of business-to-business and corporate clients and including reputation, sustainability and CSR-focused programs.

Knight (pictured right) has been freelancing since arriving in Australia in September 2010, including TMTE Group, Hausmann Communications and Hill & Knowlton. He has also worked as a trade marketing assistant at ninemsn.  In London, Knight was a senior publicist at Romley Davies Publicity managing PR campaigns for Universal Pictures and 20^th Century Fox, as well as press management of the BAFTA Children’s Awards and the EMPIRE Film Awards. At Howorth, he will be working on a number of accounts in the company’s Digital Lifestyle Group including Microsoft.

Howorth is part of Ogilvy PR Australia, the country’s largest and most awarded public relations agency, which has scooped more than 50 Australian and global trophies in the past two years. In 2010, Howorth took top honours amongst all WPP-owned worldwide PR agencies, winning best PR campaign of the year.

Since the April 2009 arrival of Brian Giesen, Regional Director of Ogilvy 360? Digital Influence, the practice has grown to 14 specialist practitioners. In that short time, the practice has seen revenue growth of 440%.

Graham White, Managing Director of Ogilvy 360? Digital Influence Australia, said the practice has experienced rapid growth from day one. “Our growth, both in people and financial performance, reflects the ongoing demand from clients across the Ogilvy Group for strategic counsel and the creation and execution of powerful social media strategies – integrated with other marketing and communications disciplines.

“We’re seeing clients continuing to push more funds into ongoing social media activity. As such, we are also adding two more hires in August to ensure we can fulfil that demand and continue to be at the forefront of social media and digital engagement in Australia.”

Ogilvy 360? Digital Influence also became the most awarded social media team in the region after winning ‘Digital Agency of the Year’ by the region’s highly coveted Holmes Report Specialist Agencies of the Year Awards in April.

Giesen said the practice was extremely proud to receive this award as it recognised the consistent and disciplined delivery of outstanding work by the team.

“This is an excellent achievement which is particularly rewarding given the challenges of growing demand as digital influence skills and successful execution become increasingly important to all of our clients,” said Giesen.

“We’re thrilled to have another new wave of experienced talent joining us. They bring with them an array of knowledge and expertise in strategic digital planning, video content creation, analysis and analytics and community management.”

The seven new hires include two Digital Strategists and five Digital Analysts. They are:

• Lachlan Hibbert-Wells, joining as a Digital Strategist from Daemon Group where he was a Digital Planning Director;
• Megan Anhalt, joining as a Digital Strategist from US-based DoSomething.org, where she was Director of Media and Talent Relations;
• Mitch Phillips, joining from OMD as a Digital Analyst to work across a number of the practice’s consumer and natural resources sector clients;
• Gregory Tan, joining as a Digital Analyst from an online retail start-up in Melbourne;
• Mark Redshaw, joining as a Digital Analyst after three years as a researcher and sub-editor at online business information service, IRD Group;
• Melanie Vaz, joining as a Digital Analyst after working in Ogilvy PR since 2009. She is currently completing Award School through the Communications Council;
• Nathalie Bulsing, joining as a Digital Analyst following four years as a microbiological analyst in The Netherlands.

Ogilvy 360? Digital Influence is Ogilvy’s industry-leading social media and word of mouth marketing practice designed to help brands in an era of changing sources of influence. It is part of Ogilvy PR Australia, a joint venture between Ogilvy PR Worldwide and STW Group, Australia’s leading marketing content and communications services group.

Ends

For further information:

Tessa Sexton

STW Group

+61 421 098 674

A one-day, portable festival which will tour various Sydney destinations by bus, Bustival will be fronted and curated by Ruby Rose as the event’s DJ, and will launch at the start of Sydney’s summer festival season. Music fans, festival-goers and Ruby followers will be invited to co-create the experience, from the music Ruby plays, to the destinations the festival visits, driven by public voting.

In addition to Bustival, the JVC Ruby Rose partnership will also see Rose appear in a range of marketing activities, including an advertising campaign, a series of digital films, and retail POS material.

Launched by the Howorth Digital Lifestyle team who will handle the PR and publicity for the partnership and the Bustival event, JVC is also working in conjunction with a number of agencies on the wider marketing activity, including IM Advertising and The Punch Agency.

JVC’s partnership with Rose is the first time the brand has brought a major personality on board to support its portfolio of audio, visual and car entertainment products in Australia. As well as integrating the products into her lifestyle, Rose will feature in marketing activities and advertising for JVC specifically created for each product category. Rose will also engage with JVC’s key target demographic talking directly with users of technology.

Commenting on the partnership, Howorth Digital Lifestyle Director Amanda Kiddle said: “Bustival is a new kind of co-created experience that invites people to get closer to, and personalise, their own festival experience.

“Ruby Rose has a strong connection with Australians from all walks of life, and the partnership with JVC will enable fans to enjoy new kinds of Ruby Rose-curated content and experiences that are delivered through JVC’s extensive range of entertainment products.”

Comments Ruby Rose: “JVC products fit really closely with how I live my life so the brand was a natural fit for me. With a number of exciting new launches scheduled for this year, there’s a product that taps in to everything I’m interested in right now, from music to filming to learning to drive – so it’s great to be working with JVC and together bringing new experiences for my fans this year.”

Ruby Rose is currently hosting MTV STYLE Sunday nights at 6:30 PM on MTV and is a proud ambassador of Head Space Australia (www.headspace.org.au).  Ruby is also currently DJing Australia wide.

Details of the Bustival event will be released throughout the coming year, and fans can get further information on the event by following: http://www.facebook.com/JVCAustralia, http://twitter.com/JVCAustralia , http://twitter.com/RubyRose1, www.rubyrose.com.au and www.facebook.com/OfficialRubyRose.

Howorth works on strategy-lead projects across the breadth of Microsoft’s business groups including consumer, enterprise, education, small business and citizenship. Recent successful projects have showcased Microsoft products and services through major consumer product launches, integrated multimedia campaigns and leading edge social media activities.

Howorth works directly with Microsoft’s partners and customers to showcase how Microsoft technologies or involvement in Microsoft-led community programs help them ‘be what’s next’. Examples of partner and customer collaborations include the Lync launch, Dynamics CRM Online launch and Cloud Computing briefings.

Howorth develops media relations campaigns that achieve maximum impact and message cut-through, while positioning Microsoft as a major enabler of the technology ecosystem and as a leading corporate citizen. The launch of Windows Phone 7 into a market dominated by competitors is an example of a high-impact campaign that Howorth managed for Microsoft, which witnessed IT media touting the event as Microsoft’s ‘comeback into the smartphone market’.

Howorth and Microsoft have developed a long term relationship, which has led to a deep mutual understanding of Microsoft’s business. The staff at Howorth have kept a consistent and insightful team working closely with Microsoft’s business in Australia.  The team reacts quickly to unforeseen issues and last minute developments, using their knowledge of the business to mobilise and craft solutions to whatever event, launch, issue, media or social media enquiry has arisen.

Graham White, managing director of Howorth, said:  “These two hires are necessary due to the continued growth of the business, following another record year in 2010. The role of editorial specialist is a new one and addresses the broader range of writing and content opportunities we are now seeing in briefs. We’re delighted to have both Heather and Jess on board.”

Jacobs has spent the past 16 years working as a journalist, specialising in writing about the media, marketing and advertising industries. Most recently, she spent four years as deputy editor on Campaign Brief and prior to this was editor of B&T. Previous roles include editor of Adbrief, senior reporter on New York-based Shoot Magazine, features editor on B&T and media reporter on Ad News.  Jacobs previously worked in PR at Marcom, Vietnam, on clients including Cathay Pacific, LG, Unilever and Hewlett Packard. In her new role she will work on creative content for Howorth’s clients and across the Ogilvy PR group.

Smart joins Howorth from the UK where she spent the past three years at Weber Shandwick in London. She was an integral member of Microsoft’s pan-EMEA account team working on raising the profile of the company across Europe, Middle East and Africa. Prior to Weber Shandwick she was a junior account executive at Hill & Knowlton London working on clients including Yahoo! and Sony.  At Howorth she will be working across Microsoft and Intel campaigns.

Howorth has appointed two senior Practice Directors to manage its ongoing growth across its consumer technology and corporate practices.

Amanda Kiddle and Kathryn Torpy will now lead Howorth’s Digital Lifestyle and Business to Business (B2B) and Corporate practices respectively.

Howorth’s Managing Director, Graham White said: “These key strategic appointments ensure that Howorth has strong and experienced leadership across key areas of the business. Both roles are vital in delivering our long term growth plan, broadening our offer and ensuring continued commitment to excellence and added value for our clients.”

Kiddle joins from the UK, bringing with her a wealth of consumer lifestyle experience, having led large consumer teams and driven award-nominated brand campaigns at some of London’s top PR firms including Edelman and Weber Shandwick UK. Kiddle’s extensive brand building and reputation management experience stretches across a range of industries and includes global clients such as Samsung, Warner Bros, Reckitt Benckiser, Mars and Kraft.

Torpy has been instrumental in the growth of Howorth’s B2B and Corporate practice since its inception in 2008. Formerly a journalist in Brisbane, including The Courier Mail, her international PR experience includes business, finance and technology from in-house and consultancy positions in the UK, US and Australia. Her more recent client experience includes Microsoft Australia, CTIMySmart, LexisNexis and Bluescope Steel.

“Howorth recorded its best ever fiscal year in 2010, with headcount now at 35 people,” said White. “In addition to our broader enterprise technology business, which had another terrific year, our B2B and Corporate and Digital Lifestyle practices both enjoyed strong growth. With these two new appointments, we are excited about the year ahead.”

Howorth is part of Ogilvy PR Australia, the country’s largest and most awarded public relations agency, which has scooped more than 50 Australian and global trophies in the past two years.  In 2010, Howorth took top honours amongst all WPP-owned worldwide PR agencies, winning best PR campaign of the year.

The seven Starlight Express Rooms are located in Australia’s major paediatric hospitals providing a medical-free respite for children and their families. Other locations include The Children’s Hospital at Westmead and the Princess Margaret Hospital for Children in Perth.

The Starlight Express Room is a place where patients can forget about the reasons why they’re in hospital and take part in fun and mayhem with Captain Starlight, alongside the latest computer games, movies, crafts and activities. Children too ill to leave their beds can join in the fun via the daily Captain Starlight shows which are broadcasted to their bedside TVs, or even have the fun and games delivered straight to their bed.

We heard Christian’s story – a young boy diagnosed with a brain tumour. The Starlight team lifted his spirits while he was undergoing treatment by giving him the space to daydream about being an astronaut, helping him build his space costume and granting him his wish of owning a cubby house. The enthusiasm, compassion and generosity of the Starlight team bring happiness to thousands of children across Australia. Most importantly, they help patients to remember how to be children again.   

The sad reality is that every minute of every day a child is admitted to a hospital in Australia.  With this demand, there is a need to open more Starlight rooms around the country. Howorth has been a long term corporate ambassador of the Starlight Children’s Foundation since 2000. Howorth is currently helping with the annual Starlight’s IT Fund for Kids charity fundraiser dinner in Sydney (Sept 30) and Melbourne (Sept 23). If you would like to attend, please contact Le Tran on +61 2 8281 3295 or at le@howorth.com.au.

Starlight will be running these morning tea sessions on a regular basis. If you would like to get involved and see how you can help, please contact Starlight’s Corporate Head of Partnerships Anne Johnston on 02 8425 5934 or anne.johnston@starlight.org.au