Rovio Entertainment, which we best known for their Angry Birds franchise, is expanding its global brand advertising partnership team with senior hires in North America, Europe and Asia Pacific. With this new team, the company will now be “a direct media partner to the largest brands in the world.” And while we’re not sure what all this means, we guess Rovio will now be pitching brands directly rather than using ad agencies.
Rovio has surpassed 1 billion downloads in May 2012, and with its 263 million monthly active users (as of December 2012), the company has both reach and high fan-engagement levels. The company’s YouTube video channel has garnered nearly 1 billion viral views, while its retail products are now generating a major part of Rovio’s revenues. As we speak, its animation studio is working on a major motion picture release.
Back to the new hires. In the US, Rovio has added two new, experienced members to the North American Brand Ad Partnership Team in New York and Los Angeles: Betsy Flounders Novak has joined the North American Team as the Director of West and Midwest; while Matt Pfeffer, the new Director of the East Coast based in New York City, joined Rovio most recently from Millennial Media.
As for the Europe and Asia Pacific regions, Todd Tran has joined to lead the new, London-based EMEA and APAC Brand Partnership Ad Team; with Raphaelle Tripet joining him in mid-February from inMobi…