Today, AOL announced the appointment of Bob Lord as the new CEO of AOL Networks, the company’s digital advertising arm.

Lord comes to AOL from Publicis Groupe, where he was CEO of Razorfish (which was acquired by Publicis in 2009) as well as CEO of Publicis’ digital technologies division.

“Bob has been a digital marketing and technology leader for nearly two decades and has worked with some of the world’s most renowned agencies and brands throughout his career,” said Tim Armstrong, chairman and CEO, AOL, in a statement. “His technology background will be pivotal as AOL continues its mission to simplify digital advertising at scale across platforms, screens and formats.”

In his new role, Lord will oversee all aspects of AOL Networks, which serves more than 22,000 publishers and 4,000 advertiser and agency clients. Lord will be based in New York, report to Armstrong and be a member of the AOL corporate leadership team.

“This is a particularly exciting time to be joining AOL Networks,” said Lord in his own statement. “Today’s advertisers and publishers want premium solutions that can be put to work simply, seamlessly and at scale.  AOL Networks is both leading and innovating in this space.”

Lord will step into his new role Aug. 1, where he will also be responsible for managing Publicis AOL Live (PAL), a new advertising partnership between Publicis and AOL that was also announced today. While details about how the partnership will function in each country are still being worked out, the partnership is a launching as a global initiative.

The partnership will offer advertisers creative and planning services. PAL will also offer content creation and syndication within AOL’s ecosystem of brands, like the Huffington Post, real-time consumer connection tools and metrics and distribution across four screens.

Additionally, clients will be able to leverage the technology platforms of all of Publicis Groupe’s companies, as well as AOL’s Live, On and Be On platforms.