Execs & Accounts: Yahoo, Obama, Molecular

Yahoo promoted Mitch Spolan to VP of North American field sales, unifying its U.S. sales organization under a single exec. Spolan was previously head of sales in the Southeast region. Separately, East Coast VP Sales Beth Lawrence was named VP of agency revenue and development. Both Spolan and Lawrence report to U.S. sales chief Joanne Bradford.

President Obama named Microsoft and Google executives to its Science and Technology Advisory Council. The chairman and CEO of Google, Eric Schmdt, was appointed to the committee, as was Craig Mundie, Microsoft’s chief research and strategy officer.

Molecular created a new executive role to support its mobile practice. The Isobar agency named Bryant Shea director of mobile. He previously served in a leadership role under the agency’s content management practice.

GSI Commerce opened an office in Canada. Among its clients north of the border is Forzani Group, a sporting goods retailer. Forazani is using GSI’s e-commerce technology, fulfillment, and call center services.

Bill Gossman will lead hi5 as CEO. Gossman, former CEO of Audience Science, was named chief exec at tier-two social net. The company’s founder, Ramu Yalamanchi, was named chief product officer.

Traffiq flows with new hires. Christopher O’Hara, senior director, agency development, was previously SVP of Reviewed.com. John Yang, director, agency development, was senior manager of business development at IAC. Eman Abuella, senior digital media strategist, was previously a media planner at Horizon Media.

Web site optimization firm Amadesa hired a new VP of sales. Tom McGurran held senior sales executive roles at Digital River, before which he was with UPS and Jasper Wireless.

Men’s media network Yardbarker nabbed a sales exec from Fox Sports. Eric Warddrip was named director of West Coast sales, a new position for Yardbarker. He was a senior account executive at FoxSports, and opened FOXsports.com’s sales office in the Northwest.