Tony Bartel
Tony Bartel is President of GameStop Corporation, the world’s largest video game retailer. He was the Executive Vice President of Merchandising and Marketing from March 2007 until June 2010. Prior to that, he was the Senior Vice President of International Finance, a role he held since joining GameStop in 2005. Prior to GameStop, Bartel was Chief Administrative Officer for NCH Corporation from 2003 to 2005. From 1989 to 2003, he held various positions with PepsiCo and Yum Brands, Inc., including operational finance, strategic planning, controller and eventually Chief Financial Officer of Pizza Hut. Prior to 1989, Bartel held various positions with KPMG Peat Marwick.
Owen Mahoney
Owen Mahoney was appointed President & Chief Executive Officer of Nexon in March 2014. Mr. Mahoney joined Nexon in 2010 and served as Chief Financial Officer and Chief Administrative Officer until 2014, responsible for managing the Company’s finances, global operations, investments and strategic alliances. Under his leadership, Nexon successfully completed its $1.2 billion initial public offering on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, and formed strategic partnerships with high-profile developers and publishers around the world.
Kristian Segerstrale
Supercell Investor/Past Board Member; Playfish (now EA) & Glu Mobile Co-Founder,Kristian Segerstrale has been at the forefront of the rapidly transforming game industry since 2001. He is co-founder and partner at Initial Capital, a seed stage investor that led the seed round of Supercell where he served on the board. Prior to that he served as Electronic Arts’ EVP of Digital, after he co-founded, ran and sold social gaming pioneer Playfish to EA for $400M in 2009. He is also co-founder of mobile gaming pioneer Macrospace – today Glu Mobile (Nasdaq: GLUU).
Randy Shaffer
Randy Shaffer is the West Coast director of U.S. Xbox LIVE Advertising Sales where he is focused on connecting brands with highly-engaged audiences across Xbox 360, Xbox LIVE, Windows 8, Windows phone, Xbox.com, MSN Games, Microsoft Game Studios, and Games for Windows.
In his role at Microsoft, Shaffer has served some of the biggest brands in the auto, entertainment and game publishing industries including Toyota, Disney and Electronic Arts (EA). To promote Disney’s TRON movie, Shaffer helped Disney develop the world’s first Kinect-enabled advertisement. His work also includes campaigns for such prominent brands as Lexus, Honda, KIA, Nissan, Hyundai, Nike, Ubisoft, Sega, T-Mobile, Microsoft, Sony Pictures, Fox, Paramount, Lionsgate, and Procter & Gamble.
Prior to Microsoft, Shaffer worked for advertising agencies Foote Cone Belding, RPA, Starcom Media Vest Group (SMG) / Play, a Denuo Company.
In addition to his passion for work, Shaffer is a gaming enthusiast with more than 45,000 Xbox achievements. In 2011, he was honored as one of thirty elite members of the Global Microsoft Next, a group selected by the president of Microsoft International as the next generation of Microsoft innovators.
A native of southern California, Shaffer holds a BA in Advertising Account Management from Chapman University in Orange County. When he is not working, Shaffer enjoys spending time with his wife and their newborn son.
Mikko Setala
Mikko Setala joined Rovio Entertainment in 2006 as the Chairman of the Board and has also served Rovio as the CFO and EVP of Corporate Development. Living currently in Los Angeles, he is the President of the Rovio subsidiaries in North America.
Mikko’s background is in the software industry and he has been an entrepreneur, worked as an executive in major software companies and also as the CEO of a listed company. Mikko has written two books and acts as an angel investor and board member.
Mikko has a M.Sc. degree from Helsinki University of Technology.
Josh Yguado
Josh Yguado is the Co-founder and President of Jam City where he oversees the company’s operations, growth strategies, and game portfolio—which has repeatedly dominated the top grossing charts of Apple, Google, and Amazon’s app stores. During his time leading the company, Josh was the driving force behind several of Jam City’s milestones including the acquisition of global game studios, exponential user growth, and new product launches.
Josh’s experience in entertainment allows Jam City to build itself as a global leader in mobile entertainment. Before launching Jam City, Josh was Vice President of Fox Entertainment—where helped Fox in its acquisition of Myspace, its creation of Hulu, and its launch of new television networks—led strategic planning for MTV Networks and Nickelodeon, and oversaw corporate development for Univision.
Among other honors, SoCalTech named Josh one of its top “50 Most Influential People” in Southern California’s technology industry and he also sits on the board of The Young Turks—the largest online news show in the world.
Josh received his bachelor’s degree and MBA from Harvard University. He lives in Los Angeles with his family.
Jonathan Anastas
At Activision, Jonathan leads all Social and Digital Marketing across the company’s many brands. Anastas helped Call of Duty, Black Ops 2 and Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 (MW3) both reach one billion dollars in Entertainment Industry record time periods, making COD the world’s largest entertainment property for the third year running. In
addition, Call of Duty has built the largest game franchise fan base on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, Instagram and YouTube. Call of Duty has won there Effies in three years, including the Grand Effie. Jonathan also contributed to Skylander’s place as the number 1 kids property of 2011 and Q1 2012, selling over a billion dollars in revenue. Prior, Jonathan ran Call of Duty’s Digital business, selling a world record 23 million map packs and generating $400 million dollars. Anastas was initially hired in 2010 to run all Global marketing for Activision’s Guitar Hero brand. Call of Duty and Guitar Hero represent the #1 and #3 all-time best-selling video game franchises.
Before joining Activision, Jonathan most recently served as Vice President, Head of Global Marketing for Atari, the legendary video game publisher. At Atari, Jonathan drove the shift to Digital marketing and distribution channels as the company’s primary selling tools. he also led the evolution from the traditional category practices of launch and awareness-based advertising to customer acquisition-based marketing, retention and CRM.
Anastas spent more than 15 years in the advertising agency business, most recently as President of Tribal DDB’s Redurban division, an Omnicom-owned digital agency where he oversaw US launch offices in New
York and Dallas. Before joining Tribal DDB, Jonathan held a number of management and account service roles at agencies including Mullen, Saatchi & Saatchi (co-founding and leading their West Coast
Interactive team) and early Omnicom digital agency THINK New Ideas, rising to the level of Executive Vice President and Managing Director. His clients included categories as varied as automotive (Toyota,
Bentley & Rolls-Royce, Mitsubishi), QSR (Arby’s), technology/gaming (Oracle, Network Associates, Time Warner Cable, Vivendi Games, Disney Interactive) and e-commerce.
Anastas is recognized as an early advocate of Digital marketing, Social and true idea-based integration across many mediums.
Rob Pardo
Rob has worked in the game industry as a game designer, executive and producer for over 20 years. For most of his career he worked at Blizzard Entertainment where he most recently served as their Chief Creative Officer. Rob is best known for his work as the Lead Designer on StarCraft: Brood War, Warcraft III and World of Warcraft. Based on the achievements of Blizzard games under his direction, Pardo was recognized by Time Magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world and The Wall Street Journal named him as one of the top 25 power players in the game industry. During his time at Blizzard, Rob was fundamental in building the game design department and culture within the company and mentoring all the senior designers within the studio. Before Rob left the studio in 2014, he was able to launch Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft as the Executive Producer.