Six Red Marbles Names New CEO
Company to integrate business lines and pursue "smart growth" strategy in 2009
Announced January 15, 2009 - Six Red Marbles (Cambridge, MA) and Monotype (Baltimore, MD) today announced that its board of directors named Jacques Driscoll as the company's chief executive officer. Driscoll succeeds Rob Lange, who remains as a member of the board.
Driscoll confirmed the combined companies' commitment to the education market and will drive integration efforts among the print, technology, and editorial businesses. "Six Red Marbles and Monotype together have the educational expertise and technological vision to revolutionize education. The boundaries between delivering curriculum digitally or through print are no longer relevant to our business. Our clients are looking for new ways to create and deliver educational materials. This team gets it. I'm truly energized to lead and expand such a creative group," said Driscoll.
"Jacques Driscoll's exceptional leadership skills and career experience will accelerate our growth in the education market. Driscoll has the passion, drive, and belief in the combined strength of Six Red Marbles and Monotype," said Steve Berger, CFO of Monotype.
Sarah White, President of Six Red Marbles, said, "I am thrilled to work with Jacques and love the personality that he brings to our companies. He has the right blend of insight and innovation. We believe in the solutions we provide to clients and Jacques' strategy and focus will help shape the evolving educational publishing market."
With the strategic acquisition and merger of Six Red Marbles and Monotype in May 2008 by private equity firm Calvert Street Capital Partners (Baltimore, MD), the two companies have successfully combined the content development, design, page composition, and technology implementations of publisher programs. Driscoll's "smart growth" plan for 2009 revolves around integrating content and technology in new ways to improve learning and streamlining development and production processes.
Driscoll comes to Six Red Marbles and Monotype with experience gained by helping more than 35 companies transform their businesses, differentiate themselves from their competition, achieve record sales and build strong brands in the US and around the world. He has extensive senior management experience on both the agency and client side - with a broad background in advertising, publishing, banking, design, insurance, and retail - that will help shape new ways of thinking about educational publishing. Driscoll most recently was owner of the boutique brand consultancy Spyglass Creative, and Executive Vice President of Hudson United Bank, where he led 1500 people to record sales. Driscoll spent four years at West Publishing, now a part of Thomson Reuters, where he helped transition the world's leading legal publisher from print-dependency to a profitable multi-channel distribution system.
The MITX (Massachusetts Innovation & Technology Exchange) Awards is the largest and most prestigious awards competition in the country for interactive and web innovations and celebrates the best creative and technological accomplishments emerging from New England.
Six Red Marbles was recently named a finalist for the 2007 MITX awards in the Education category. The first product is an online lesson planner for Harcourt Achieve's Literacy by Design program and the second product is the redesign and creation of Flash games for the Merriam Webster's Word Central site for kids.
Best Course/ Classroom Management Solution 
Nine of us had the opportunity to attend the MITX Awards last Wednesday, an award ceremony honoring the top multimedia vendors and designers in Massachusetts. A data management system Six Red Marbles built for Harcourt Achieve in the English Language Learner area was nominated as a finalist. Although we didn't win this year it was a great event with inspirational products and a lot of laughs at a decent comedian who hosted.
