Evoke Kyne global CEO David Kyne has been named as Evoke’s group president of communications.
With Kyne’s move, Maureen Byrne has been promoted to president of Evoke Kyne, taking over Kyne’s global leadership responsibilities. Aside from Evoke Kyne, Evoke includes specialty agency units Evoke Navience and Evoke Firsthand.
Reporting to Evoke founder and CEO Reid Connolly, Kyne will now oversee development and diversification of Evoke’s global communications offering.
“I am responsible for the comms function at Evoke, which we are looking to continue to grow and evolve,” said Kyne. “I am also working on having the comms function and advertising and marketing work closer together. This is a newly created role and reflective of the ambitions of Evoke to grow and continue to invest in communications.”
Byrne reports to Kyne and is responsible for management of Evoke Kyne’s global client portfolio, executive leadership team and more than 175 employees across geographies.
“[Byrne’s] role is basically the same as my global CEO job, but we are harmonizing the titles within Evoke so that the heads of the individual agencies are presidents,” said Kyne.
Byrne noted that in her new role she is focused on continuing to deliver Evoke Kyne’s mission, which is about advancing health and well-being worldwide through communications.
“I am focusing on helping our teams to continue to innovate to reflect changes in how people are accessing and digesting healthcare information today,” she said. “It is about embracing new and emerging technologies and embedding data and analytics in all that we do.”
She added that Evoke Kyne wants to work on programs that address some of the greatest healthcare issues people are facing today, such as access to information, equitable and inclusive care, rare diseases, cancers and women’s health.
“I am thrilled [Byrne] is taking on this role and after 13 years leading Evoke Kyne it’s the right time,” said Kyne. “We have been working on this succession for a while. [Byrne] has been here seven years and has been a driver of our growth.”
Most recently, Byrne was a partner at Evoke Kyne, overseeing global client service. Under Byrne’s leadership and building on the firm’s more than 25% annual revenue growth in 2021, the agency will further invest in and strengthen its healthcare expertise including within its specialty creative, digital and social and earned media teams and practice areas. Already in 2022, the firm has secured several new AOR biopharmaceutical client wins including in women’s health and gene therapy.
Byrne’s previous role will not specifically be replaced but the firm is making new appointments to support continued diversification and growth across North America and global practice areas: Stephanie DeViteri was upped to head of North America; Kaitlyn Belicose was promoted to EVP and MD of New York; Celeste Farzetta was upped to EVP and MD of Philadelphia; and Darcy Sawatzki was upped to EVP and head of public health and team lead for Los Angeles.
Additionally, Maryellen Royle, previously Evoke Kyne partner, has been elevated to lead global operations of Evoke’s communications group.
The leadership restructure took place in January.
Evoke has offices in New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Los Angeles, London, Dublin, Princeton and Chicago. The agency is part of Huntsworth, an international healthcare and communications group, which was acquired by Clayton, Dubilier & Rice in May 2020.
Evoke Kyne posted 23% revenue growth in 2020 to nearly $31 million, according to PRWeek’s Agency Business Report 2021.
This story originally appeared on PRWeek US.
