Michael Epstein, Global CEO of Starcom, is a distinguished leader with a proven track record of pushing boundaries, fostering growth and championing diversity in the industry.
Since joining Starcom in 2021, Michael has secured significant media agency of record victories, including AB InBev, McDonald’s, Aldi and Frontier Communications and expanded capabilities with long-standing clients, such as Kellogg’s. His leadership has driven the agency's impressive financial performance, with new business growth skyrocketing.
Starcom Canada’s President, Christine Saunders, joined the agency 12 years ago to run the Procter & Gamble AOR and never looked back. She has held increasingly senior responsibilities, most recently serving as EVP, Managing Director, juggling both Client Services and Business Development for Starcom and Spark Foundry Canada. Christine was an integral part of the Management team under Alastair Taylor that saw tremendous double digital organic and new business growth. Prior to joining the Publicis Groupe family, Christine worked at a number of different holding companies as a business lead, leading teams across strategy and activation across many industries, including consumer packaged goods, automotive and retail.
Rathi Gangappa is the Chief Executive Officer of Starcom India, one of the fastest growing agencies in India.
She is a media and brand communications specialist, with a rich experience of over 20 years across client, publisher and agency ecosystems. Her previous stints include GroupM and Vodafone among others.
Rathi has helmed high-profile brand campaigns on the client’s side and headed country-wide operations for media agencies. She has been in leadership roles, requiring an execution focus in complex cross-cultural environments, driving transformation programs, building capability, and nurturing talent.
She has always enjoyed celebrating creativity within media and has been an integral part of award-winning campaigns.
Paul Boulange is the CEO of Starcom France and brings more than 17 years of strategic marketing leadership experience to the role. Prior to being named Starcom France’s CEO in 2018, Paul served as Managing Director where he was responsible for leading two of the office’s key clients: Coca-Cola and Samsung. An agency veteran, Paul was previously Digital Manager at Havas Worldwide Paris from 2013 -2015where heled EDF, Veolia and Paypal EMEA accounts. Before then, he served in a key leadership role at DDB Paris where he set up McDonald's digital e-commerce strategy and data platform for France and Southern Europe. Paul began his career as a marketing consultant specializing in telecommunications and spent six years at Full Six, where he worked on French and international clients such as Renault, Nokia, SNCF, TF1 and SFR. Paul also served as Head of Digital Academy for leading global insurer AXA.
Rita Gutierrez is CEO of Starcom Spain, a role that she has held since 2017. As Starcom Spain’s CEO, Rita is responsible for driving Starcom’s strategy, capabilities and growth. Rita joined Starcom in 2008 to lead and strengthen Starcom Barcelona’s presence, successfully managing teams and clients including Puig, Desigual, Asics, Ausonia & Arbora, Cadbury, Camper, Levi’s, Honda and Panrico. Prior to joining Starcom, Rita held positions at Havas in Madrid. Later she went on to form part of the founding team at Arena (Havas) servicing clients such as Banco Santander, Amena and Campofrio Food Group. When Arena won the Barcelona-based Seat/Vaesa account, Rita was part of the founding team of Arena in the Barcelona office, leading the Client Service teams. As client service director at Arena Barcelona, she also worked with Damm, Planeta and Yves Sant Laurent.
Magda Kolenkiewicz is the general manager of Starcom Poland. In 2004, she joined Starcom and has been responsible for clients including Kraft Foods Polska, Deichmann, ZT Kruszwica and Raiffeisen Polbank.
Magda was co-author of campaigns that were awarded and recognized during key Polish and international advertisement competitions, i.e., Festival of Media, Effie Awards and Media Trendy. One of her major professional successes was managing Milka’s social campaign called “Milka. Together for the Tatras,” the most awarded campaign in the history of the Media Trendy competition.
In 2017, Magda was a jury member at the Festival of Media Global and is a current jury member of the Euro Effie Awards.
With international and local experience in the media industry, Birgit is keen to drive innovation and a challenger mindset throughout the agency. With more than 25 years of experience in the media industry, Birgit joined Publicis Groupe in 2015. In 2017, she moved from Zenith (where she held the COO position) into her current new role at Starcom. Before her time at Publicis Media she was with Group M, and, prior to that, she was with MediaCom in an international role as Managing Director, EMEA for P&G, based in London. She was also at MEC (CEO, Germany) and Carat where she spent 12 years, half of this time as managing director, during which she built and established the Berlin office.
As the agency’s global leader on data technology & analytics, Kelly works with the agency’s client teams to ensure Starcom delivers advanced data-driven strategy at scale. She is responsible for helping Starcom’s global clients determine their overarching data vision, while also collaborating with client teams to create the roadmaps and project plans that will bring that vision to life. As Starcom’s resident expert on the complex and evolving data landscape, Kelly serves as a strategic client counselor on audience intelligence, measurement, optimization, analytics, data platforms, data privacy, data governance and more. She also plays a critical role connecting global data expertise across Starcom and Publicis Groupe, thereby building agency capabilities to deliver mature, ID-level data solutions that power audience segmentations, advanced analytics/attribution, and AI-enabled programmatic investment strategies.