John Schappert (video game executive)

John Schappert
Nationality  United States
Occupation video game executive and entrepreneur
Known for Co-founder of Tiburon Entertainment
Notable work Developing Madden NFL

John Schappert is an American video game executive and entrepreneur. Schappert is best known for co-founding Tiburon Entertainment with Jason Andersen and Steve Chiang in 1994 (developer of the Madden NFL series of video games for Electronic Arts). He is also known for his tenure as Zynga's Chief Operating Officer from 2011 to 2012. Before joining Zynga, Schappert served as the Chief Operating Officer of Electronic Arts from 2009 to 2011. He also oversaw Xbox Live and Microsoft Game Studios as a Corporate Vice President of Microsoft from 2007 to 2009. Schappert most recently founded Shiver Entertainment in 2013.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8]

Career

The first reference to John Schappert is as an Apple IIGS programmer working for a company called Visual Concepts in California in 1992. Electronic Arts hired Visual Concepts to work on its Madden NFL '94 video game for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). The EA/Visual Concepts partnership continued through the development of Madden NFL '95. Then Schappert and two other Visual Concepts engineers (Jason Andersen and Steve Chiang) quit Visual Concepts, moved to Orlando, and co-founded Tiburon Entertainment in 1994. Tiburon took over development of Madden NFL '96 for the SNES. In 1995, EA contracted with Tiburon to develop a new college football game (which became NCAA Football 98, released in 1997).

The EA/Tiburon partnership flourished and led to the acquisition of Tiburon by EA in 1998 (Tiburon became EA Tiburon after joining EA). All Madden NFL development work went to Tiburon after the acquisition.[9] Schappert served as Vice President and General Manager of EA Tiburon. Schappert was eventually promoted to Vice President and General Manager for the large EA Canada studio in Vancouver in 2002, leaving Orlando behind. He became Senior Vice President and Group General Manager in 2003, overseeing EA Canada, EA Tiburon, EA Black Box, and EA Chicago. In 2006 Schappert became Chief Operating Officer of EA World Wide Studios.

2007 brought a big change for Schappert as he left EA and joined Microsoft in Seattle as Corporate Vice President of Live Software and Services with oversight over the Xbox Live business as well as Games for Windows (including Microsoft Game Studios) and Xbox Live Arcade.

Schappert went back to EA (and San Francisco) in 2009 to become Chief Operating Officer for the whole company.[10][11]

In 2011 Schappert joined Zynga as Chief Operating Officer.[12] He helped take Zynga public in late 2011. He left Zynga in 2012.[13]

Schappert moved back to Florida and founded Shiver Entertainment in 2013. The new company is based in Miami.[14][15] The Korean and Japanese game company Nexon invested in Shiver and entered into a publishing partnership with the start-up to bring its games to market.[16]

References

  1. ↑ "Zynga COO John Schappert quits". Fortune. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  2. ↑ Campbell, Colin (2013-09-09). "Former Zynga and EA COO John Schappert forms new studio, Shiver Entertainment". Polygon. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  3. ↑ "John Schappert Returns to EA as Chief Operating Officer (NASDAQ:EA)". investor.ea.com. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  4. ↑ CNBC.com, Chris Morris|Special to (2009-06-19). "Microsoft Is Losing Another Top-Level Xbox Manager". CNBC. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  5. ↑ "Microsoft's John Schappert coming back to EA". The Technology Chronicles. 2009-06-19. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  6. ↑ Pham, Alex (2012-05-03). "Zynga's chief operating officer plays it safe". Los Angeles Times. ISSN 0458-3035. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  7. ↑ "From triple-A to free-to-play: John Schappert on mobile, PC and a changing industry landscape". Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  8. ↑ "UPDATE 3-EA's COO leaves for Zynga - sources". Reuters. 2011-04-26. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  9. ↑ Paprocki, Matt (2017-08-22). "The asterisk on Madden's annual release legacy". Polygon. Retrieved 2017-11-26.
  10. ↑ "John Schappert leaves Microsoft, returns to EA". Engadget. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  11. ↑ Totilo, Stephen. "Microsoft's John Schappert Leaves Msoft For EA, Not Being Replaced". Kotaku. Retrieved 2017-11-24.
  12. ↑ "EA's COO John Schappert Leaves to Join Zynga". AllThingsD. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  13. ↑ Writer, BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Technology. "Zynga COO John Schappert resigns". sandiegouniontribune.com. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  14. ↑ "Stocks". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved 2017-11-26.
  15. ↑ "John Schappert surfaces with Shiver Entertainment". GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved 2017-11-19.
  16. ↑ "Nexon invests in former EA, Zynga COO's studio, Shiver Entertainment". Engadget. Retrieved 2017-12-04.
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