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Harrison: Past and Present
Two years after dangling below the share price threshold of the NASDAQ Stock Exchange, Atari is climbing slowly back from the brink. But while ruthless restructuring of parent company Infogrames has brought stability, only in the last year has it seen renewed vision.
January’s headline appointment of CEO David Gardner, a 25-year veteran of EA, was quickly followed by that of president Phil Harrison, former head of Sony Worldwide Studios.
EDGE: What was the feeling like upon leaving Sony? Mission accomplished?
Harrison: It’s really difficult to talk about the decisions I took, partly because it’s a very personal issue and partly because I don’t feel it necessary to talk negative about friends and colleagues. I’d rather talk about our opportunity without framing anything.
Let me answer in a positive way. After 15-and-a-half years working for a great company, I thought it was time to take on a new challenge and had always wanted to do something entrepreneur-like. I respected my friends in the industry who had taken that leap.
And, at 37, I was thinking that if I don’t do it now, I’m going to wake up at 50 going: ‘You know what? I wish I’d taken that on’. So it was time to test myself, and working with David was an opportunity to bring to life a shared vision. We had this lunch together, and between the starter and the main course we decided to do this.
It was that obvious that we shared the same goals and positivity about the way the industry was changing. If we were to take an aggressive or slightly accelerated view of that natural evolution, we could make a unique opportunity for ourselves, the company, the people we work with and the team we built around us.
Were Atari’s troubles at the time part of that vision – a challenge?
This isn’t new information, but our original plan was to start our own company. It was while studying that process that David met the asset management company that owned the majority share holding of Infogrames. So we decided to take our blank-sheet-of-paper vision and apply it to Atari.
You’ve spoken about terminating certain products that didn’t suit the Atari brand or were otherwise not viable. What qualified them?
It was predominantly quality grounds. So by extension it was economic grounds because we weren’t going to sell enough copies to get a return on our investment. In a couple of cases, we terminated product that clearly wasn’t going to have a role in the long-term connected future of the company.
Perhaps understandably, you’ve also made a big thing of Atari being such a recognisable brand. Is there a fear of relying on the brand rather than reinventing it?
I think it’s important to make a distinction between a logo and a brand. A logo is a set of pixels; a brand is a feeling, an emotion. It’s something that people trust or something they love, and you’re absolutely right. We have to regain the trust of all our stakeholders, gamers first because I think they’re the most important, then media, retailers, business partners and developers. We’re making great strides but we’re not so arrogant as to say, you know, we’ve done it. We’re just beginning.
January’s headline appointment of CEO David Gardner, a 25-year veteran of EA, was quickly followed by that of president Phil Harrison, former head of Sony Worldwide Studios.
EDGE: What was the feeling like upon leaving Sony? Mission accomplished?
Harrison: It’s really difficult to talk about the decisions I took, partly because it’s a very personal issue and partly because I don’t feel it necessary to talk negative about friends and colleagues. I’d rather talk about our opportunity without framing anything.
Let me answer in a positive way. After 15-and-a-half years working for a great company, I thought it was time to take on a new challenge and had always wanted to do something entrepreneur-like. I respected my friends in the industry who had taken that leap.
And, at 37, I was thinking that if I don’t do it now, I’m going to wake up at 50 going: ‘You know what? I wish I’d taken that on’. So it was time to test myself, and working with David was an opportunity to bring to life a shared vision. We had this lunch together, and between the starter and the main course we decided to do this.
It was that obvious that we shared the same goals and positivity about the way the industry was changing. If we were to take an aggressive or slightly accelerated view of that natural evolution, we could make a unique opportunity for ourselves, the company, the people we work with and the team we built around us.
Were Atari’s troubles at the time part of that vision – a challenge?
This isn’t new information, but our original plan was to start our own company. It was while studying that process that David met the asset management company that owned the majority share holding of Infogrames. So we decided to take our blank-sheet-of-paper vision and apply it to Atari.
You’ve spoken about terminating certain products that didn’t suit the Atari brand or were otherwise not viable. What qualified them?
It was predominantly quality grounds. So by extension it was economic grounds because we weren’t going to sell enough copies to get a return on our investment. In a couple of cases, we terminated product that clearly wasn’t going to have a role in the long-term connected future of the company.
Perhaps understandably, you’ve also made a big thing of Atari being such a recognisable brand. Is there a fear of relying on the brand rather than reinventing it?
I think it’s important to make a distinction between a logo and a brand. A logo is a set of pixels; a brand is a feeling, an emotion. It’s something that people trust or something they love, and you’re absolutely right. We have to regain the trust of all our stakeholders, gamers first because I think they’re the most important, then media, retailers, business partners and developers. We’re making great strides but we’re not so arrogant as to say, you know, we’ve done it. We’re just beginning.
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Copyright 2006 - 2009 Future Publishing Limited, Beauford Court 30 Monmouth Street Bath, UK BA1 2BW
England and Wales company registration number 2008885
Phil is a fascinating, awesome guy, completely different from someone like Kotick or Riccitiello.
And thank God for that...
He's already done amazing things at Atari, a company that was basically "dead" (for, what, the fourth time?) a year ago. I love where he's taking them. There are so few CEOs who you can look at and say, "They're great for the industry." Phil is one of those CEOs, one of the good guys who seems to care about more than just making money.
Couldn't agree more. Harrison's move from such a big company like Sony to a little one such as Atari (in my mind) raises too many questions. However Atari can now look forward to what is hopefully the first of many influencial changes in the companies ethos and , under Harrison, I feel that the future looks pretty promising for them [Atari].
I have no idea what this story was about I just had to say nice avatar pic.
Whose, mine or lifeat30fps? I think there both pretty good.
Well, I'm a huge Tekken fan and am pretty good at it (at least during the Tekken Tag era) but I meant your's Byron. Mine is supposed to be master chief from the initial Halo 3 trailer, but sometimes my avatar is something else I don't know why it changes on its own sometimes.
[Going off topic] Man I miss Hworang [if thats even how you spell it] Tekken Tag & Tekken 3 get my vote. They make the PS1 worth playing, even today.
Ha, yeah I played in one tournament before and got 3rd place. The guy used Hwoarang and he actually used him right and I lost to him. I was able to be good because I knew how to defend against all the character's attacks but since no one ever used Hwoarang right I didn't know how to defend against him (he lured me into doing Paul's power fist thing by hopping on one leg and side stepping as soon as I lunged forward then went right into his pattern..ouch I'll never forget that). I used Paul (I know I know) and Lei Wulong (I was a beast at Lei, he's way overpowered if you use him right). Tekken 4 really stunk IMO and I never gave 5 a shot. I guess now that Tekken 6 is coming to the 360 I don't have to buy a PS3 anymore (unless I decide to for the way better d-pad). Tekken 3 and Tekken Tag were def awesome games; I hope 6 gets it right.
Tekken 6 is coming to the 360, awesome cant wait for that. Do you have a blog cos Im looking for something to read that doesn't include sales figures?
(Oh and I've been off Tekken for so long I can't even use Hwoarang anymore. Coming third is still pretty awesome.)
Yeah...third was ok. I played at an arcade in the northwest phoenix area and I hadn't lost pretty much ever. I might have lost 1 out of 100 matches (no exaggeration) and if I did lose, I would beat the person who beat me and it was usually due to boredom. I went to another arcade in a different area trying to see if there was anyone there that was good. I played this kid that was supposed to be the best there and he picked that devil flying cheap thing and he got totally annihilated. He played it off as if he wasn't playing serious, whatever. So I had high hopes going into that tournament. I was killing everyone and would have won if it wasn't for that one time I got duped. That is one game though that I can honestly say I was better with an arcade stick. The tournament was played on a PS2 and I was used to the arcade which was about a frame or two faster than the PS2 version which is enough to throw off an expert player's timing. All excuses aside, I was happy and a little disappointed at the same time...
No, no blog. The closest thing would be my bio on my 360 I update regularly (my gamertage is O1, it’s just the letter O followed by the number 1).
Given that Phil says he will only talk about the positives of his move from Sony, one wonders what advice he gave that they ignored with the PS3. But their loss is truly Atari's gain.
Brian
www.brianwoods.com