John Riccitiello (pictured) was apparently the “worst CEO” within the video games business.
That is in line with former Activision Blizzard chief exec, Bobby Kotick – himself a controversial enterprise determine for the market – who stated on the Grit present that he would have paid to be sure that his rival stored the highest job at EA. Kotick appeared on the present with former EA chief artistic officer, Bing Gordon.
“I am not saying this as a result of [Gordon is] sitting right here,” stated Kotick, as transcribed by GameSpot.
“Our concern was all the time that Bing was going to run [EA]. And we’d have paid for Riccitiello to remain a CEO without end… like we thought he was the worst CEO in video video games.”
Regardless of the animosity in the direction of its CEO – the rivalry between the 2 firms – there have been many merger talks over time between EA and Activision Blizzard.
“[EA] tried to purchase us a bunch of instances. We had merger conversations,” recalled Kotick.
He went on so as to add that EA’s “enterprise [was] in quite a lot of methods was higher than ours.”
Riccitiello joined EA in 1997 as its president and chief working officer, earlier than leaving and returning to the corporate in 2007 as its CEO. He left in 2013 resulting from Digital Arts’ poor fiscal efficiency. The next 12 months, he turned chief exec of engine big Unity, earlier than leaving amid controversy in 2023.
Earlier than leaving Unity, nevertheless, he did give this interview with our sibling web site PocketGamer.biz wherein he referred to as some builders “the largest fucking idiots”. What a man.
