Mike Hayes (businessman)

Last updated

Mike Hayes
Born
OccupationBusinessman

Michael Hayes is an English businessman, best known as the former president and CEO of SEGA Europe and SEGA of America (collectively SEGA West). He has also held executive positions at Codemasters and Nintendo UK and currently leads the digital and e-commerce division of Mercia Fund Management. [1] [2] [3]

Career

Mike Hayes was involved in the localization of StarCraft at Blizzard Entertainments in 1998. [4] From 2002 to 2003, he was credited in various Codemasters games for a role in public relations. [4]

During the late 1980s, Mike was employed by General Foods (soon to be bought by Kraft), where he was a Brand Manager and then Marketing Manager on their desserts products including Angel Delight and Bird's Custard. It is unknown where he was employed between then and 2001.

He joined the company in 2004 as managing director. [5] In 2005, Hayes became president contributing to the company's reinvention from a hardware maker to a third-party games publisher. In his tenure as COO of SEGA Europe, he was credited for restoring SEGA's dominance in Europe by setting up the now-defunct Sega Racing Studio and acquiring video game studios Creative Assembly and Sports Interactive. [6]

In June 2009, Mike Hayes replaced Simon Jeffery as President of Sega of Europe & America. [7] [8] He remained Sega's president until June 2012. [1]

Related Research Articles

Sonic Team is a video game developer owned by the Japanese video game company Sega as part of its Sega CS Research and Development No. 2 division. Sonic Team is best known for the long-running Sonic the Hedgehog series and games such as Nights into Dreams and Phantasy Star Online.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Electronic Arts</span> American video game company

Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the designers and programmers responsible for its games as "software artists". EA published numerous games and some productivity software for personal computers, all of which were developed by external individuals or groups until 1987's Skate or Die!. The company shifted toward internal game studios, often through acquisitions, such as Distinctive Software becoming EA Canada in 1991.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Take-Two Interactive</span> American video game holding company

Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. is an American video game holding company based in New York City founded by Ryan Brant in September 1993.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sports Interactive</span> British video game developer

Sports Interactive Limited is a British video game developer based in London, best known for the Football Manager series. Founded by brothers Oliver and Paul Collyer in July 1994, the studio was acquired by Japanese video game publisher Sega in 2006 and became part of Sega Europe. In addition to its work on Football Manager, the studio has also created a number of other sports-management simulations, including NHL Eastside Hockey Manager and Championship Manager Quiz, and is the former developer of Championship Manager.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Codemasters</span> British video game developer

The Codemasters Software Company Limited is a British video game developer based in Southam, England, which is a subsidiary of American corporation Electronic Arts and managed under its EA Sports division. Founded by brothers Richard and David Darling in October 1986, Codemasters is one of the oldest British game studios, and in 2005 was named the best independent video game developer by magazine Develop. It formerly also published third-party games.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sega AM2</span> Japanese video game developer

Sega AM Research & Development No. 2, previously known as SEGA-AM2 Co., Ltd., is a video game development team within the Japanese multinational video game developer Sega. Yu Suzuki, who had previously developed arcade games for Sega including Hang-On and Out Run, was the first manager of the department.

Criterion Games is a British video game developer based in Guildford. Founded in January 1996 as a division of Criterion Software, it was owned by Canon Inc. until Criterion Software was sold to Electronic Arts in October 2004. Many of Criterion Games' titles were built on the RenderWare engine, which Criterion Software developed. Notable games developed by Criterion Games include racing video games in the Burnout and Need for Speed series. As of April 2017, Criterion Games employ approximately 90 people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sumo Digital</span> British video game developer

Sumo Digital Ltd. is a British video game developer based in Sheffield and the principal subsidiary of Sumo Group. The company was founded in 2003 by four former members of the management team of Infogrames Studios and, as of 2023, employs more than 1100 people in 16 studios.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Warner Bros. Games</span> American video game publisher

Warner Bros. Games is an American video game publisher based in Burbank, California, and part of the Global Streaming and Interactive Entertainment unit of Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). The publisher was founded as Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment on January 14, 2004, under Warner Bros. Entertainment and transferred to its Home Entertainment division when that company was formed in October 2005. Warner Bros. Games manages the wholly owned game development studios TT Games, Rocksteady Studios, NetherRealm Studios, Monolith Productions, WB Games Boston, Avalanche Software, and WB Games Montréal, among others.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Toshihiro Nagoshi</span> Japanese video game designer

Toshihiro Nagoshi is a Japanese video game producer, director and designer. He was the chief creative officer for Sega until 2021 when he became creative director. He went on to be the general director of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, and later became a member of the board of directors for Atlus. He joined Sega in 1989. After 30 years in the company, Nagoshi left Sega to join NetEase in late 2021, where he founded the studio Nagoshi Studio.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Moore (businessman)</span> British-American business executive

Peter Moore is a British-American business executive. He is known for his former positions as senior VP of Global Sports Marketing at Reebok, president of Sega of America, and corporate vice-president of Microsoft's Interactive Entertainment Business division, overseeing the Xbox and Xbox 360 game consoles. From 2007 to 2011, he was head of Electronic Arts' EA Sports game division. In 2012, he was appointed COO of Electronic Arts. He resigned from EA in February 2017 to become CEO of Liverpool Football Club. It was announced in July 2020 that Moore would be leaving Liverpool at the end of August that year, having completed his three-year tenure with the club.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sega AM1</span> Japanese development team within Sega

Sega AM Research & Development No. 1 is a development department within Japanese video game developer Sega that also previously existed as Wow Entertainment and Sega Wow Inc. AM1 spent most of its early existence under the leadership of Rikiya Nakagawa and developed a number of arcade games for Sega.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atsushi Inaba</span> Japanese video game producer

Atsushi Inaba is a Japanese video game producer and businessman. He was the former CEO and producer of the Capcom subsidiary Clover Studio, who developed the games Viewtiful Joe, Ōkami, and God Hand. He is currently the head producer at the development division at PlatinumGames and the CEO since 2021, after years being vice-president in the company.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sega development studios</span> Internal video game studios of Sega

This is a list of development studios owned by Sega, a Japanese video game developer and publisher based in Tokyo, Japan. Accompanied with the list is their history of game development. Also included are the companies that Sega has acquired over the years. For a full list of games developed and published by Sega, see List of Sega video games, List of Sega mobile games and List of Sega arcade games.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sega</span> Japanese video game company

Sega Corporation is a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company headquartered in Shinagawa, Tokyo. Its international branches, Sega of America and Sega Europe, are headquartered in Irvine, California, and London, respectively. Its division for the development of both arcade games and home video games, Sega Games, has existed in its current state since 2020; from 2015 to that point, the two had made up separate entities known as Sega Games and Sega Interactive Co., Ltd. Sega is a subsidiary of Sega Sammy Holdings. From 1983 until 2001, Sega also developed video game consoles.

Team17 Group plc is a British video game developer and publisher based in Wakefield, England. The venture was created in December 1990 through the merger of British publisher 17-Bit Software and Swedish developer Team 7. At the time, the two companies consisted of and were led by Michael Robinson, Martyn Brown and Debbie Bestwick, and Andreas Tadic, Rico Holmes and Peter Tuleby, respectively. Bestwick later became and presently serves as Team17's chief executive officer. After their first game, Full Contact (1991) for the Amiga, the studio followed up with multiple number-one releases on that platform and saw major success with Andy Davidson's Worms in 1995, the resulting franchise of which still remains as the company's primary development output, having developed over 20 entries in it.

Mercia Fund Management, which is now known as Mercia Fund Managers or Mercia is part of Mercia Technologies PLC. It is a UK-based venture capital fund manager. The company provides venture capital to businesses focused on innovative technologies. Mercia offers investment under the Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS) and the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS), both investment-based tax-reliefs, operating one of the largest such combined funds in the United Kingdom. Startups in which Mercia has invested have gone on to earn awards for their innovations. Allinea Software was a 2011 Red Herring Global 100 winner and Molecular Solar earned the 2011 Lord Stafford Innovation in Development award. In April 2021, Mercia co-authored a report on UK-India Energy Opportunities with think tank Bridge India and law firm Howard Kennedy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of Sega</span> History of Japanese video game company

The history of Sega, a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company, has roots tracing back to Standard Games in 1940 and Service Games of Japan in the 1950s. The formation of the company known today as Sega is traced back to the founding of Nihon Goraku Bussan, which became known as Sega Enterprises, Ltd. following the acquisition of Rosen Enterprises in 1965. Originally an importer of coin-operated arcade games to Japan and manufacturer of slot machines and jukeboxes, Sega began developing its own arcade games in 1966 with Periscope, which became a surprise success and led to more arcade machine development. In 1969, Gulf and Western Industries bought Sega, which continued its arcade game business through the 1970s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hardlight</span> British mobile game developer owned by Sega

Hardlight is a British video game developer founded by Sega and based in Leamington Spa, England. Revealed in January 2012, it is focused on mobile games for smartphones and became part of Sega Europe.

References

  1. 1 2 Weber, Rachel (19 September 2013). "Ex-Sega CEO joins VC fund Mercia Fund Management".
  2. Rose, Mike (18 September 2013). "Former Sega CEO Mike Hayes heading up new game VC fund".
  3. Tipps, Seth (19 September 2013). "Mike Hayes heads VC's new games division".
  4. 1 2 "Mike Hayes" . Retrieved 6 October 2013.
  5. Headhunter: Redemption Manuals
  6. Maxwell, Ben (30 April 2012). "Sega Europe and US boss Mike Hayes to step down".
  7. Seganerds.com Archived 20 June 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  8. MCVUK.com