Swinard new head honcho for Burnett North America

Andrew Swinard, Burnett’s new North American CEO

New chief executive of Leo Burnett North America is Andrew Swinand, a former media agency executive and Starcom MediaVest Group, who was hired to help strengthen the agency after it lost McDonald’s to Omnicom last year.

Swinand will report to Publicis North America CEO Andrew Bruce and work closely with Judy John, COO Leo Burnett North America, CCO, Mark Tutssel and Rich Stoddart, who was named Leo Burnett global CEO nearly a year ago.

Leo Burnett also acquired Swinand’s analytics software maker, Ardent IO and startup incubator The Abundancy. Sixty staffers from Swinard’s two companies will move to Leo Burnett Chicago later this month.

“By combining our data-driven insights with Leo Burnett’s award-winning creative capabilities,” Swinard wrote in an internal memo, “we will make Leo Burnett’s HumanKind approach more powerful than ever before in helping our clients.”

Swinand also launched Transparent Media Partners in 2015 and Frequency540 in 2011. Beginning in 2000, he spent nearly 11 years as president of Starcom MediaVest Group, following three- and-a-half years in brand management for Procter & Gamble and two-and-a-half years as an account supervisor for BBDO.