Bromberg succeeds interim CEO Jim Whitehurst, who will transition to the role of executive chair of the board. Roelof Botha will move from chairman of the board back to lead independent director.
I find it interesting that both the “new ceo” news and the “unity 6 preview” story are released simultaneously. I ask myself if that was a move to burry some news or generate positive momentum for both
UPDATE:
Since the comments are already all about negativity I thought I give some hope with this find (thanks to reddit):
3 Years ago (MB about acquisitions):
Quotes:
“It’s general a terrible idea to try to fix your own problems by buying another company.”
“I think the mistake that a lof of companies make when … they get into the game of the transaction and imagine that the transaction is the point of the whole thing when in fact the point is the next three years …”
Does not sound so bad to me. Ofc one never really knows but I feel like that he is quite different from former CEO JR.
Everything I’m finding says that he’s been involved in mobile and online game development with a focus on esports games, and in the financial industry outside of game development. He’s involved with a company called Blackstone which is a private equity company similar to Silver Lake.
His Linkedin suggests that he was involved in FIFA which for anyone who isn’t aware was one of EA’s “let’s put out a new game every year with almost nothing changed” sports games.
After everything that happened in recent years, I did not expect Unity to hire a former EA and former Zynga executive as the new CEO. Is this move completely tone deaf, or is there something I am missing?
Yeah, this whole trend what we see on mobile started with Facebook, Zynga and Farmville after all.
Zynga, EA, Blackstone …
Total joy to have him. I’m sure nobody better could have been found.
“Founded and led a location-based communication platform that rewarded kids for staying connected to their parents. By sharing location, taking pictures, tagging friends, and updating their status, kids earned points that could be exchanged for parental rewards. Acquired in a private transaction.”
Hey, exploiting children and child labor is the industry standard nowadays. Just take a look at Epic/Fortnite and Roblox. I guess Unity doesn’t want to be left out of that pie.
I cant believe that after everything they put another Riccitiello in place. Unity really is so out of touch / incapable of reading the room even when the room is shouting at them and on fire.
It is totally on brand though. Ignore every single feedback users give, do their own thing, watch as everything burns down, the staff tries to defend every single misstep in overtime. Rinse and repeat.
Even before that Zynga was developing addictive Facebook games like Mafia Wars and whatnot. That was less monetized, but hey, they had to learn how to exploit people properly somehow…
0 lessons learned. I guess no one wanted the job in a failing, unprofitable company and he’s here to do another performance of extraction capitalism to enrich himself and his ilk while the product continues to slowly decay.
I think people just got confused and hopeful for a bit because some Unity employees stated that the vibe is different and the air has changed and the focus is renewed and whatever else they deluded themselves with.
Yes, when computers had a reset button and you pressed it, eventually it rebooted and you got back exactly where you were (with the added possibility of some bad sectors).
Did you really think things were going to get better just because “we hear you” Hahahaha…
i thought you were here just like me, because you need to finish your main project to finally forget about this sinking boat…
Well, for a dating app, i guess red is good XD (bad joke, sorry)
I remember there was a backlash because they didn’t even change the signs with the previous years texts XD, i fits perfectly here i guess
mg -.-"
I don’t even know what to say… I still think these guys wants Unity to be an assets for another company and i really feel like unity 6 is their “final fantasy” if you know what i mean…
Most of the community prefer to learn a whole new game engine and get away from unity now, but i guess, the smartest thing to do here is, instead of listen to your community and regain the their trust like for example: Hello Games or CD Project Red (the first 2 that came to my mind) … no no what are you? smart?.. no we need to follow the most loved company in the gaming industry, yes, EA, making money on unethical and almost ilegal ways like, like… runtime fees yeah!!! and lets hire a guy who runs companies that are operating in the red… yeah, i can smell the money from here…
No. I knew a “reset” meant doubling down on mobile gaming and ad revenue. I just wasn’t expecting a second and quite possibly worse version of John Riccitiello. I was thinking we would end up with a CEO more along the lines of Jim Whitehurst.
“Whitehurst gave off the energy you find around many executives in the traditional corporate world, but his words grew sharp when he described how most companies are “big, dull, beaurecratic things.” It was here he seemed to cast a critical eye back at the Runtime Fee fiasco, warning how companies that build great products, become “sales-led,” start not building great products, and then become “finance-led.””
I read that and realized Jim was done for. The investment bankers running Unity were never going to take that kind of talk lying down.
