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.