Howard Bank, now the largest bank headquartered in the Baltimore region following announcement of its plan to acquire Patapsco Bancorp Inc. of Dundalk, has named Clapp Communications as its public relations agency. Also at Clapp, Karen Evander has joined as marketing assistant.

ParkRe, a free real-estate app that helps people find homes for sale in Baltimore that offer off-street parking, announced it will launch this month. The app was developed by Locust Point-based ​Mindgrub​, along with South Baltimore Realtor Ronald Monk. Features include filters to sort listings based on types of parking, and beacon alerts that notify users when a ParkRe property is nearby.

Merkle announced that Adam Lavelle has joined as chief growth officer, digital marketing, bringing more than 20 years of experience to the Columbia-based digital marketing agency. He previously served as the chief strategy officer for digital marketing agency iCrossing, a division of Hearst.

LMO Advertising announced two new hires for the Arlington-based agency’s Baltimore office: Ravi Kumar has been added as a senior business intelligence developer, and Chris Miller has been hired as a senior .Net developer.

Hanover-based Ciena Corporation announced that Marcus Starke has joined as senior vice president and chief marketing officer. Starke will oversee all global marketing and communications activities. He most recently served as CMO at MicroStrategy, and also was senior vice president, worldwide marketing and communications at SAP.

GKV was named agency of record for Network Health, a Wisconsin-based health insurance provider. GKV’s first assignment is to develop an integrated multi-media campaign for the Medicare Annual Enrollment Period and its Medicare Age-In Campaign for 2015.

Baltimore-based Kinglet hired Planit to build awareness for the company that offers office space to emerging companies through its digital marketplace.