The Trade Desk has hired Christos Nikitopoulos as its new general manager of business development.

Reporting to Marion Hargett, the company’s New York-based VP of business development, Nikitopoulos will be based in Toronto, where The Trade Desk recently opened a new office from which it is looking to expand its presence in the Canadian market.

He will focus on building and maintaining relationships with advertisers and agencies to build the company’s footprint across the Canadian media marketplace. He will also work with corporate and product marketing on the go-to-market strategies.

Nikitopoulos is coming off of eight years of leadership positions at Google Canada, most recently leading the company’s various agency teams. Prior to joining Google, he also held senior roles with Rogers, CBC and the Olympic Media Consortium.

In addition to rapidly signing partners on to cookie alternative UID 2.0, The Trade Desk has also been focused on bringing its programmatic capabilities to the connected TV realm, an area where Nikitopoulos said the company had been growing relationships with advertisers and agencies.