Bill Oberlander has joined JWT New York as executive creative director, where he will oversee the Microsoft Commercial business. He joins a Microsoft team that includes Jeremy Postaer on Bing and Jim Hord on Microsoft Office.
Most recently, Oberlander served as chief creative officer/executive VP of Cossette New York. There he worked on Estée Lauder, Carlsberg Beer, and Cannondale Bikes, among other brands.
Prior to assuming the lead creative role at Cossette, Oberlander was exec creative director at McCann Erickson, where he pitched and won the $350 million Intel business. Before that, he also spent time at Ogilvy on Motorola, AT&T Wireless, Sprite, Ameritrade and Nestlé Waters.
During the 1990s, he served as a managing partner/exec creative director at Kirshenbaum Bond & Partners. Under his watch, the agency grew from 17 employees to 400. It also blossomed from two accounts to a wide portfolio of clients, which included Citi, Coach, Target, and Snapple.
As former president of the Art Directors Club, Oberlander is also credited with re-establishing it as a top industry organization. Under his watch, the ADC launched the Young Guns Awards Show, recognizing industry talent under the age of 30.
He currently teaches advertising at the School of Visual Arts New York and serves on the Ad Council Creative Review Committee, where he reviews and directs pro-bono campaigns for the country’s leading non-profits.
Apple and Google Face UK Investigation Into Mobile Browser Dominance
Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers, a British watchdog said Friday in a report that recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year.
The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker's tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. Apple does this by restricting progressive web apps, which don't need to be downloaded from an app store and aren't subject to app store commissions, the report said.
"This technology is not able to fully take off on iOS devices," the watchdog said in a provisional report on its investigation into mobile browsers that it opened after an initial study concluded that Apple and Google effectively have a chokehold on "mobile ecosystems."
The CMA's report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers "the clearest or easiest option."
And it said that the a revenue-sharing deal between the two U.S. Big Tech companies "significantly reduces their financial incentives" to compete in mobile browsers on Apple's iOS operating system for iPhones.
Both companies said they will "engage constructively" with the CMA.
Apple said it disagreed with the findings and said it was concerned that the recommendations would undermine user privacy and security.
Google said the openness of its Android mobile operating system "has helped to expand choice, reduce prices and democratize access to smartphones and apps" and that it's "committed to open platforms that empower consumers."
It's the latest move by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to crack down on the... Read More