Interactive Ontario Welcomes New Team Members
Interactive Ontario (IO) is pleased to welcome Patricia McCutcheon and Armen Karapetyan to its growing team and is bidding farewell to Sarah Baird, VP Programmes and Operations.
Patricia McCutcheon will be taking on the role of Director of Programmes where she will oversee programming for the upcoming iLunch 9.0 series, GameON: Finance and INplay 2011 conferences. Armen Karapetyan is IO’s new Director of Operations, and will be primarily responsible for IO’s financials, forecasting and human resources management.
Patricia McCutcheon was the National Organizer, Digital Media for ACTRA National for 4 years. She was with ACTRA for 7 years prior to that holding various positions within the Commercials department for ACTRA Toronto. After leaving ACTRA, Patricia had short-term contracts with the OMDC, Allstream and most recently as Director, Business Development at Spark Inc. a corporate event management company. Patricia studied Commerce with a major in marketing at Concordia University. She has also studied Business and New Media at Ryerson University.
Prior to his move to Canada and current role with IO, Armen was the Operations Director of the 
Barthelmes Conservatory of Music in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Before leading Conservatory operations, Armen also served as finance and grants manager for several international relief and development organizations, such as Feed the Children, Open Society Institute and Jinishian Memorial Foundation. Armen holds a Master’s degree in Physics from Yerevan State University in Armenia and Master’s degree in Business Administration from American University of Armenia.
“We are very excited to have Patricia and Armen join our team. With their wealth of knowledge and experience, I know they will strengthen IO’s efforts to better the interactive industry in Ontario,” said Ian Kelso, President and CEO, Interactive Ontario.
IO also notes the departure of Sarah Baird, who joined Interactive Ontario in 2005 as the organization’s first full-time employee. Over the past five years Sarah has overseen the 
programming and logistics for all IO’s efforts. In this time IO has successfully hosted over 750 speakers at over 70 events ranging in size from industry networking events to multi-day/multi-stream conference such as IN. Since Sarah joined the organization, IO has grown from just over 50 companies to more than 260 companies at present.
“Sarah’s contribution to IO has been critical to its success. Her passion and dedication to the industry and to our mission as an organization has always been exceptional. We certainly wish her the best and thank her for her many years of service,” says Kelso.
Taking on an expanded role within the organization is Max Berdowski, now Vice President, Business Development & Communications. In addition to developing partnerships, Max takes on responsibility for IO membership, communications and marketing. As well, Communications Director, Danielle Engels, who has been with IO for 2.5 years adds IO’s marketing efforts to her portfolio.
