Bigpoint Adds International Management for Next Phase of Growth

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• Publié par: bigpoint-gmbh
• Nombre de lectures: 27
• Langue: English

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Bigpoint Adds International Management for

Next Phase of Growth

PR Newswire

HAMBURG, Germany, July 19, 2012

HAMBURG, Germany

,

July 19, 2012

/PRNewswire/ --

Bigpoint has strengthened its management with the appointment of an

international team at C-level to support founder and CEO Heiko Hubertz in leading

the next phase of growth

Key new hires are Christian Unger (interim COO), former CEO of Ringier and

Tradus, Khaled Helioui (Chief Games Officer), an experienced internet and online

gaming investor

Claire Davenport (Chief Commercial Officer) and Tim Weickert (Chief Technical

Officer) are also part of the new management team

Reorganisation to focus on core competencies of market-leading browser games

development and international distribution with 4 senior regional managers, and a

number of new office locations planned

Bigpoint (http://www.bigpoint.com),

Europe's

number 1 online-games developer

and publisher, is adding depth to its senior management team with a series of

new appointments. The goal of these changes is to increase focus on Bigpoint's

core capabilities: game development and international game distribution. Local

offices in

Paris

,

London

,

Rome

,

San Francisco

and

Sao Paulo

will be

strengthened, distribution offices in new locations will soon be opened, and

more resources will be allocated to key games. Selected third party developers

will be able to publish their games to the full Bigpoint network. In the mobile

space, Bigpoint is adopting a new strategy in which it will increasingly work with

external studios rather than in-house developers, and will look to expand the

successful distribution network model to mobile.

"In the past few years, Bigpoint has developed incredibly quickly from a small

start-up to a large, internationally successful business with partners and

customers around the world. We had outgrown our original structure. This new

structure and team represent an important step in order to position us for the

next five years and to further expand our international market leadership. We

want to have the best browser games in our portfolio, whether developed

internally or by third parties, and we want to continue to be the number 1

browser games publisher in every market where we are present", says founder

and CEO Heiko Hubertz.

Christian Unger adds more senior experience to the

team

Christian Unger will be supporting Bigpoint with the implementation of the new

structure and with the next steps of international growth. From 2009 until

April

2012

, Christian was CEO of Ringier AG, the biggest media group in

Switzerland

.

Prior to this, he led Tradus plc., an e-commerce company with online-auction

platforms and e-commerce portals in twelve countries. During his time at

Tradus, the stock price tripled. The 44-year-old father-of-three started his

career with Bertelsmann where he held several positions, most recently as CEO

of Bertelsmann China. Christian Unger will be reporting directly to Heiko

Hubertz, founder and CEO, and will be supporting Bigpoint on an interim basis.

The second new addition to the management team is French-Tunisian Khaled

Helioui who joins as Chief Games Officer and will run the whole product

department - from new game development to game life cycle management of

blockbusters such as Battlestar Galactica Online, Farmerama and Drakensang

Online. Khaled joins from TA Associates, a global growth equity firm, where he

covered the Technology space from 2009 until

May 2012

and was notably

involved in their investment in Bigpoint. He was previously at UBS AG advising

Technology companies across

Europe

on their capital raising and M&A

considerations.

Claire Davenport, an experienced British executive who has previously held

senior positions at RTL Group and Skype, and who has been with Bigpoint for

over a year, will continue to run the distribution arm of the business as Chief

Commercial Officer, now including the

USA

. Meanwhile, Tim Weickert, former

IT Director of Bigpoint, has been promoted to Chief Technical Officer where he

will focus on building up the flexibility and stability of the technical

infrastructure to have the best gaming platform as the company's operations

and international user base continue to expand.

"I am pleased to support the company, in such a dynamic market environment,

with its transformation and to contribute my experiences in the area of change

management and international growth", says Christian Unger, COO Bigpoint.

As part of the transformation, Nils Holger Henning (former Chief

Communication Officer), as well as Tobias and Philip Reisberger (Managing

Directors at Bigpoint Luxemburg) are leaving the company to pursue their own

businesses.

About Bigpoint:

Bigpoint (http://www.bigpoint.com) is

Europe's

leading online-game developer,

publisher and content provider for more than 1,000 global distribution partners.

Bigpoint's free-to-play games are played by over 280 million registered users in

over 30 languages. The company's diversified portfolio includes high quality

games for browser, mobile and social platforms. More than 800 employees

from over 35 different nations work at the company headquarters in

Hamburg,

Germany

or at other locations in

Berlin

,

San Francisco

,

London

,

Paris

, São Paulo

and

Malta

. Bigpoint's many distinctions in the industry include the European

Business Award 2011, the Mashable Best Online Game Award for "Farmerama",

the "Fastest Growing Larger Company" and "Uniqueness of Offering" prizes at

the 2010 Media Momentum Awards, as well as the MTV Skyscraper Award for

extraordinary achievement in game development. For more information or

press material, please visit the press area at http://www.bigpoint.net.

Further information:

http://www.bigpoint.com

http://www.bigpoint.net

Press Contact

Sandra Braun

Vice President

Drehbahn 47-48

20354 Hamburg

T: [phone] - 191

E: [e-mail]

Janine Griffel

Griffel & Co Kommunikation GmbH

Forsmannstr. 8 b

22303 Hamburg

T: [phone]

E: [e-mail]