EBS Partnership Hires New Director Kane To Head PR And Marketing

The EBS Partnership, which owns the Electronic Broking Service (EBS), has hired a new manager of press relations and marketing. Tina Kane joins the consortium from Buchanan Communications, a London financial PR consultancy. Kane has worked on press relations and some marketing for EBS and for FX Net (which EBS is now servicing through its acquisition of Citicorp Dealing Resources) for six years. She reports to EBS chairman Peter Bartko.

Kane, who started last week, is taking over a group of six marketing staff formerly part of CDR, which EBS bought earlier this year (FXW, July 8). CDR formerly managed marketing for EBS under its contract as technology supplier to the service. All six of the marketers are based in CDR's former US headquarters outside New York City, which EBS has elected to retain in the short term. The central computer system for the service is also based in the US.

Observers close to the consortium have suggested that EBS's acquisition of CDR was partly driven by a desire to have full control of marketing for its own product, which suggests that some changes are in the wind. However, Kane says, for the moment she has no plans for any alterations in marketing strategy or additions to staff. "It's early days," she says. "My feet are barely under the desk."

In the short term, says Kane, her focus will be on the PR side of her job, raising EBS's profile in Continental Europe, where she says the service has reasonably good market penetration but little press coverage, particularly in France and Germany. She will be working on "developing an image and 'branding' for the enlarged EBS business", she says. In the longer term, says Kane, she expects EBS "to go forward aggressively in capturing market share of electronic broking in the spot market while considering development of new services to foreign exchange traders".