Senior leadership team.
Neil Dorrian
Sales & Marketing DirectorNeil started his career as a service engineer and swiftly moved onto to installs for an EPOS company that serviced pub and hotels in his home town of Preston. He made his move into Sales (and moved down south at the same time) when he moved to work for the Retail division of Toshiba. After leading the Direct Major Accounts team selling POS across hospitality and retail, he left to join Evoke as Sales Director.
He's loved being part of smaller fast paced business, and has now been with us for 6 years!
We asked Neil…
- What’s your favourite song? Beatles – I am the Walrus – random but brings back memories of my dad!
- What’s your favourite sport? Football, Golf – any sport really – just ask my wife!!
- What’s your favourite book? James Patterson books – I’ve read most of them!
- What is something that people wouldn’t guess about you? I once won the Butlins junior tiddlywinks championship
Simon Taylor
Customer Account DirectorSimon started out his career on the Sainsbury’s famous graduate programme. He worked his way from graduate trainee all the way through to regional management, before moving into Head Office where he worked across many exciting programmes in their Business Transformation Team.
After he made the leap to supplier side 14 years later, he found a passion for technologies that supported the customer journey, and ended up working on self-service technologies just as the industry was kicking off. His people skills won out, and soon he found himself working on Account and Business Development. Simon joined Evoke in 2013, bringing his experience in the sector to lead our Customer Accounts team.
WE ASKED SIMON...
- What song do you have on repeat? Otis’ Redding’s “(Sittin' on) the Dock of the Bay”
- What’s your favourite film? Se7en
- What’s your go-to podcast? Peter Crouch
- What’s as in interesting fact about you? My Best Man at my wedding is now one of the chasers in Channel 4’s Hunted.
Kyle Krulac
Vice President, North AmericaWith a varied career across manufacturing and distribution, Kyle has headed up our commercial function in North America form our office in South Carolina for the last 4 years.
Starting in finance for metal heat treating, Kyle took the plunge with his first sales role in commercial tire distribution and a move to sunshine state, Florida. After a successful career in sales, he tried his hand at IT business development to learn more about the software sales side of tech which took him back to his first love; South Carolina. He joined Evoke when we first started to explore the North American market and has been with us ever since!
WE ASKED KYLE...
- What is your go to read? Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer
- Favourite film? Wedding Crashers
- What's your spare time hobby? I'm a slight aviation geek
- What's something that we wouldn't guess about you? I may or may not tear up during a good romcom
Peter edwards
CEOPeter started out as a biologist and dabbled in sales, but quickly found a love of tech, and moved into IT in the 80s. He’s been focused on hospitality tech since the mid-90s and notes that being the UK MD of Micros (now Oracle) was a career highlight.
Before joining us at Evoke, he was the COO for Zonal where he used his passion for putting the customer first to grow the business from £15m to £65m.
He brought his passion and expertise to Evoke in 2022 as our new CEO.
WE ASKED PETER...
- What’s your favourite book? The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami
- Favourite food? Fish finger butty
- Favourite song? Teenage Kicks, Undertones
- What did you want to be when you grew up? A grown up
Dean ward
Founder & Chief Product OfficerDean’s a designer at heart. He studied product design at University and started his career working in shop fit design before joining an award-winning design company who designed products for JCB, Tomy Toys and Unilever. That’s where he met Neil and Evoke was born!
Evoke started out small in 2006 but now has more than 150 employees and operates globally, bringing hardware and software solutions.
Dean still sits at the heart of Evoke, where he brings his passion and experience in product design as our Chief Product Officer.
WE ASKED DEAN...
- What’s your favourite film? The Big Blue
- Favourite food? Southern Style Slow cooked BBQ
- Favourite hobby? Far too many, but playing the guitar (badly)!
- What is one thing people wouldn’t guess about you? I’ve competed as a powerlifter
Mark Jones
Design DirectorMark doesn’t do things by halves! Finishing with a 1st in Industrial Design, he knew exactly what he wanted to design. He did a placement year at redten Digital who make photo processing kiosks and then headed down to Birmingham to work for a kiosk manufacturer where he designed kiosks for brands who have led the way in kiosk innovation in the past; Fujifilm, the Job Centre, Boots and HMV.
From there, he headed up a design team for a company who specialised in designing for the educational sector and who manufacture metalwork on-site. This sort of unique opportunity to work at all stages of the product development made him perfect for Evoke!
WE ASKED MARK...
- What is your favourite film? My top 5, in no particular order are: The Bodyguard, Pearl Harbor, 13 Going On 30, The Holiday, Mission Impossible 2
- Your favourite book? I Am a Tiger – my daughter’s favourite book!
- Do you have a hobby? My kids!
- What did you want to be growing up? A designer (it’s the only thing I’ve ever been half decent at!)
neil clark
FounderNeil’s passion for design started early, studying Product Design in Newcastle and quickly moving into an award-winning agency. He led the way in designing products for brands like JCB, Tomy Toys and Unilver and its where Neil and Co-founder Dean met!
Between them, they took this design agency and created Evoke in 2006. They found a passion for kiosk development and went on to winning some fantastic Clients. Under Neil’s leadership as CEO, Evoke grew A new focus was born and as CEO Neil grew the business to more than 150 employees and global coverage.
WE ASKED NEIL...
- What’s your favourite film? Ferris Bueller’s Day off
- What do you like doing in your spare time? Playing Rugby, golf and classic car rallying
- Favourite food? A Sunday Roast
- What did you want to be when you grew up? A racing car driver
Simon Frost
COOSimon is passionate about the hospitality sector. Educated in Hospitality & Institutional Management, he started his career on a graduate programme with a nationwide hotel chain.
Simon has held senior roles across businesses such as Micros (now Oracle), Omnico and Zonal, leading business-wide operational and commercial growth projects. He’s worked across every function in a business, from operations, technical teams (software and manufacturing), and product development, to sales & marketing, professional services and customer success.
He brings his breadth of experience to Evoke to lead as our Chief Operating Officer.
WE ASKED SIMON...
- Favourite film? Anything 80s!
- Favourite podcast: Anything related to autobiographical accounts
- Favourite Sport: Rugby Union, Motorsport, Golf!
- Something that people wouldn’t guess about you? I was part of a youth training scheme for a couple of professional football clubs across East Anglia.
Andrew Evans
IT DirectorAndrew has worked in technical leadership roles for more than 25 years. From repairing aircraft instrumentation and navigation systems in the RAF, to working as senior software developer and technical architect across the finance, legal and compliance sectors, Andrew has had a fascinating career!
Fully versed in agile delivery, Andrew joined Evoke in 2017 where he has developed the application architecture and grown the incredible team responsible for delivering kiosk applications and Evoke Cloud.
WE ASKED ANDREW...
- What’s your favourite book? Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
- If you had to pick one film, what would it be? True Romance
- When you’re not at Evoke what are you doing? Restoring a 1972 VW Camper
- Tell us an interesting fact about yourself? I once fell into a crevasse while mountaineering in the Alps (luckily I was roped up!)
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