• by Wayne Friedman , December 8, 2008

Former Carat executive Bruce Dennler will be rejoined with David Verklin in a new position at Canoe Ventures, the cable industry's advanced advertising consortium, as part of a series of new hires.

Dennler had worked with Verklin, now CEO of Canoe Ventures, when the two were at Carat. In 15 years at the media agency, Dennler held various positions, including president of Carat USA, and executive vice president and director of planning for Carat North America. Most recently, Dennler was president of The Nielsen Co.'s Nielsen Entertainment division. Before that, Dennler was president/COO of Palisades MediaGroup.

In addition, Time Warner Cable executive John Collins will be senior vice president of product development, working on technology and marketing teams that help cable operators with their growing two-way, digital infrastructure. Collins had been group vice president of advanced advertising technologies for Time Warner Cable.

Collins also held senior positions working for Time Warner Cable Direct and Cablevision Systems' Rainbow Advertising Sales Corporation.

Premiere Retail Networks' senior executive Mark Mitchell will become senior vice president and chief relationship officer of network relations, focusing on addressable and interactive advertising research products with national cable and broadcast television networks.

Mitchell was with PRN, the largest retail television business, for five years. Before that, he spent more than a decade at ABC Television Network in senior positions: vice president of sales daytime, children's and SoapNet divisions; vice president of sports sales and prime-time sales. Canoe Ventures is a venture between some of the largest U.S. cable operators: Bright House Networks, Cablevision Systems Corp., Charter Communications, Comcast, Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable.