Hearst, Virtue, Publicis Media, Iris Worldwide: Meet The Drum Content Awards Judges 2019

Kershaw heads up a team of multi-disciplinary content and social experts at Iris who plan, create, produce, and distribute content of extraordinary value to consumers and brands. Key clients include, Adidas, Barclaycard, cinch, Formula E, Samsung, Starbucks and Suzuki. He spent the first 10 years of his career working for content owners across music, TV, radio, print and digital, including the BBC, Channel 4, Kiss FM, Bauer, The Guardian, Ministry of Sound and MTV – where his team won a prestigious BAFTA award.

Knox is an experienced marketing and business professional with over 14 years of brand and communication experience across Europe. She has worked in both large networks and small independent companies in the creative industries in London and Amsterdam. Know is managing director, Northern Europe for Virtue, a full service creative agency born from VICE, one of the fastest growing youth media and entertainment companies. She is responsible for leading and growing the business within the UK, the Nordics and Europe. In her previous role at Sunshine, Know spearheaded the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction partnership, orchestrating a string of retail, media and talent partnerships.

Parker has 18 years experience working at a number of high profile agencies in PR, sponsorship, marketing and creative. He is director of creative partnerships at CLICKON Media, a creative marketing and production partner which focuses on creating authentic human focused stories for clients such as Red Bull, the US Navy, Special Olympics and Eurotunnel. Having started in Glasgow working in sport sponsorship with Tennent's Lager and Bell's Whisky, Parker then moved to London and to Hill & Knowlton where he worked with Adidas on their athlete activation and product launches and also with Carling on their rebranding of the Football League Cup.

Gray heads up the Hearst Studio in the UK, helping to bridge the gap between the editorial and commercial worlds. She oversees a team of editors, art directors, designers and video creatives in the ideation and creation of branded content across all of Hearst's titles and platforms. Before joining Hearst in 2016, Gray worked as an editor on the branded content team at The Telegraph, focusing on fashion and lifestyle. She has also worked on editorial teams at Marie Claire and Redbook, and written for Glamour, Stylist, InStyle and more.

Mai is an multiple award winning marketer and creative armed with an unparalleled track record of creating engaging 360 degree campaigns that truly resonate with global youth audiences. At Boiler Room he leads a division with teams across marketing, communications, film, production, music programming and creative. He recently launched 4:3, an award winning platform designed to evolve the media brand by merging live events, video content and the role of cultural institution. His work has been recognised over 70 times with awards and nominations from the likes of Cannes Lion, D&AD, Eurobetst, Creative Circle, Digiday, the Webbys, Lovies, Masters of Marketing and beyond.

Jones joined DCM in October 2012 and has since been responsible for shaping brand messaging and marketing for DCM. She has spent her whole career working in the media industry and prior to DCM, Jones held senior marketing and communications roles at Clear Channel and PPA – the trade association for consumer and B2B magazine publishers.

Newman has over 20 years experience in the world of media and content. He currently heads up the UK content practice for Publicis Media supporting clients in their needs across media partnerships, influencer marketing, content insight and consultancy through to the production of the stories brands need to tell. Prior to this, he spent four years heading up content partnerships at Publicis working with clients like Samsung, FCA, Visa, Royal London, Brown Foreman and Heineken UK. In doing so, he championed the search for new and interesting media owners for brands to partner with; essentially leading the team from being a traditional sponsorship unit into the social media publisher space.