Newsmakers.

Advertising & P.R.

Tod Rathbone has been appointed associate creative director and vice president at the Rabuck Agency, an advertising firm in Los Angeles. In his new position, Rathbone will work with each of the agency's clients, including Buy.com, Homestore.com, and Wells Fargo. He most recently held senior management positions at a number of advertising agencies.

Architecture

David J. Woo has joined Cannon Dworsky, an architectural engineering and planning firm in Los Angeles, as associate vice president. He will be responsible for leading the firm's technical quality programs in Los Angeles. Prior to joining the company, Woo was senior project architect at Gensler in Santa Monica.

Banking & Finance

Kathleen Brown has been named managing director and senior advisor of the West Coast wealth management business at the Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in Los Angeles. She will have direct client responsibility, and will help coordinate the firm's efforts to provide its private clients with investment services as well as insight into the global economy and markets. Brown, the former California treasurer, was most recently employed by Bank of America, where she was president of its private bank.

Stephen W. Fillet has joined the technology investment banking department of CIBC World Markets, an investment banking firm in Los Angeles, as an executive director in the firm's Internet infrastructure and enhanced data services group. Fillet heads the firm's digital new media practice in the western U.S., which focuses on public offerings, private placements and mergers and acquisitions for companies that facilitate the creation, delivery and management of next-generation content, services and applications for the Internet. He was most recently a principal and senior technology banker in the corporate finance department of Roth Capital Partners.

Education

Barbara Morton has joined Total Education Solutions, a special education services provider in South Pasadena, as vice president of contracted special education services. She will oversee the provision of services to 1,000 students with special needs in over 35 charter schools and public schools throughout the state. Morton was most recently with the El Dorado County office of education as director of the El Dorado County special education local plan area.

Entertainment

Ariel Veneziano has joined Alliance Atlantis Pictures International in Los Angeles as director of international sales. She will be responsible for international distribution with a focus on the independent and specialized films and will be actively involved with Alliance Atlantis' acquisitions of motion pictures projects and completed independent films. Previously, Veneziano worked at Menemsha Entertainment.

Health Care

Corn Tellez has been named to head the new health plans division for Health Net Inc., an HMO in Los Angeles. The division includes all of the company's health plans in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, New Jersey, New York, Oregon and Pennsylvania. Previously, Tellez served as head of the western division, overseeing health plans in Arizona, California and Oregon. Gary Velasquez also has an expanded role at the company. He will be presiding over Health Net's new business transformation and innovation services division, which includes the company's new ventures group, as well as all of the company's information technology/information services operation. Prior to his new appointment, Velasquez oversaw the new ventures group and the company's government and specialty services division. Health Net has also named Tim Moore chief medical officer. He will work closely with the company's medical directors on the company's national medical management program, as well as oversee the company's pharmacy benefit management subsidiary, Integrated Pharmaceutical Services Inc.

Michael Villaire has been hired as the new director of programs and operations at the Institute for Healthcare Advancement in Whittier. He will be responsible for overseeing all of the IHA's educational programs, publishing efforts and initiatives on the Internet. Villaire most recently served as assistant managing editor of WebRN, a nurse-oriented news Web site owned and operated by WebMD Corp.

Hospitality

Paul Rotunno has been appointed director of sales at the Omni Los Angeles Hotel. In this position, Rotunno is responsible for providing leadership and supervision of the hotel's sales team and management of corporate and association group business and travel industry sales. He was most recently with the Hilton Whittier, where he served as director of sales.

Law

Philip E. Cook, Maria K. Nelson and Rick L. Shackelford have all been named partners at Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue in Los Angeles. Cook and Shackelford are both members of the firm's litigation group and the general litigation practice. Nelson is a member of the litigation group and intellectual property practice.

Jeffrey F. Craft and Marc. E. Hankin have joined Los Angeles law firm Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal as partners. Craft's practice involves all aspects of the protection of intellectual property, with an emphasis on patent and trademark litigation and the preparation and prosecution of patent applications. Hankin litigates in all areas of intellectual property law, primarily patent and trademark infringement litigation.

Media

Vicki Lins has been promoted to senior vice president, marketing and communications at Adlink, a cable media buying company in Los Angeles. She will oversee the advertising, promotions, public relations and creative services departments. Most recently she was vice president, marketing and communications.

Renee Williams has been named vice president of membership marketing at KCET-TV, the West Coast flagship station for PBS. She will be responsible for developing and implementing innovative strategies to increase membership for KCET, while maintaining the quality of service provided to its existing supporters. Williams was previously advertising, marketing and communications director at the Los Angeles Times. Also new to KCET is Rosemary Bianco, who has been named executive producer of marketing production at KCET. She is based in Los Angeles and will be responsible for the production of the station's quarterly on-air fundraising efforts. Bianco most recently served as production manager and senior producer for L.A. City View Channel 35.

Nonprofits

Sam Duncan has been elected chair of the March of Dimes' Southern California chapter executive committee. He is currently the president of Ralphs Grocery Co.'s supermarket division.

Joseph W. Dunn has joined the Los Angeles Free Clinic as executive director. He will be responsible for all programs, operations and strategic vision for the $7 million nonprofit agency. Dunn is the former president and CEO of Daniel Freedman Hospitals.

Personnel

Laurie Damron has been promoted to director of recruitment at Decision Toolbox, an outsourced recruitment solutions provider in Long Beach. She will manage a large group of recruiters and project managers and participate heavily in the pre-engineering aspects of the company's sales cycle.

Joan Levine has joined the Los Angeles office of Lee Hecht Harrison, a career services firm, as senior vice president and general manager. She is responsible for all sales and marketing for the Los Angeles office, and has been charged with building the company's presence in the area. Levine most recently held the same position at Lee Hecht Harrision's Phoenix office.

Stacey W. Meyer has been appointed vice president at Gary Kaplan & Associates, an executive search firm in Pasadena. In addition to responsibilities in human resources and executive recruiting, Meyer assumes additional responsibility for business development and management for the search firm's higher education and nonprofit clients. She has been a principal of the firm since 1998.

Pay-for-Position Portal Draws New COO

WITH all the dot-corn failures, one might have expected that when Jaynie Studenmund decided to leave her post as COO of PayMyBills.com she'd choose calmer seas.

But she has decided to continue riding the technology wave as the new chief operating officer of Pasadena-based GoTo.com.

In her new position, Studenmund will be responsible for leading GoTo's U.S. search business, which includes the advertiser, affiliate and technology groups.

"I think my background is complementary to GoTo's business," she said. "I have a personal agenda that is performance driven and has a huge sense of urgency."

Studenmund believes she can execute that plan by helping the company gather more advertisers for its pay-for-performance search engine, in which companies bid for priority placement in users' search results. The paid search results appear ranked in descending order of bid price, and the advertiser pays GoTo the amount of its bid only when a consumer clicks on the advertiser's listing.

"Traffic has increased, so we need to increase the number of advertisers to keep up," she said.

As of third quarter 2000 (the most recent reported figures), GoTo had approximately 32,000 paying advertisers, who place their product, service and information offerings through each of GoTo's services.

"One of the things that makes GoTo a standout is the enormous revenue growth," she said. "We have a very clear path to profitability, which should take place in the fourth quarter of this year."

For now, the company's relentless drive towards profits appears to be characterizing the day-to-day climate of her new job. "I'm investing some time in all areas, but the reality is that the business is moving fast, so I've got to get in and manage things," she said.

Conor Dougherty