OpenAI has appointed Julia Hoffmann and Andrew McKechnie, who bring experience from Google, Apple and DDB, to two new creative leadership roles for the business.
Hoffman, who is based in London and becomes head of international creative, will oversee international brand expression for the company and creative execution across campaigns, experiences and regional markets. She was at Google for six years as executive creative director at the tech company’s EMEA Creative Lab. She also had a year-long stint as executive creative director EF Education in Switzerland, before which she spent five years at Etsy as a global creative director, based in Germany.
McKechnie is based in New York and has joined as head of business creative, leading creative strategy and development across OpenAI’s developer, start-ups and enterprise business. He was most recently head of marketing at Airco, a carbon conversion tech company, where he spent just under two years. Before that he had a six-year stint at Verizon as chief creative officer and senior vice-president.
Starting in 2014, McKechnie worked at Apple as global head of design for three years, during which time he reframed Apple's hardware focus with its first global campaign showcasing its ecosystem story via users’ creative expression through a range of products, integrating hardware, accessories and apps.
Prior to working brand side, McKechnie held senior global roles at agencies in North America and Singapore, including global executive creative director posts at DDB New York and VMLY&R. He began his career as a copywriter in Singapore for FCB and then BBDO.
Both Hoffman and McKechnie report to Michael Tabtabai, vice-president of global creative, who joined OpenAI in August and is based in Portland, Oregon. Tabtabai has also held creative roles both agency and brand side, with experience at Coinbase, Google and Wieden & Kennedy.
Tabtabai is building a global creative team to help OpenAI communicate its mission and products, and support its user base of people and organisations.
He said: “Andrew and Julia are exceptional creative leaders who bring incredible creative pedigree and deep category experience to our global creative studio. As we grow our business categories, quality of craft and creative clarity remain essential.”
OpenAI recently launched ChatGPT’s first large-scale brand campaign, aiming to showcase how people can use ChatGPT in everyday moments. Previous marketing efforts from the OpenAI team have focused on cultural brand moments, including a debut ad during Super Bowl LVIX.
McKechnie added: “I’ve always believed creativity is one of the most powerful tools for translating complex technologies. Exceptional design and storytelling bring humanity and relevance, making emerging innovation feel inevitable rather than intimidating. Building new creative capabilities across the enterprise and developer ecosystem allows us to shape that understanding from the ground up.”
