Realtime Worlds – Will Leverett, Patrick Bays
Recently, Realtime Worlds announced that it has enhanced its Operations Team in Boulder, Colorado. Will Leverett has been named Director of Customer Service, working on numerous facets of an online persistent world, and Patrick Bays is now Manager of Game Operations, designing a robust and scalable publishing platform for delivering content to customers.

"We're rapidly building up our Operations capability towards a successful launch of APB and beyond, and are delighted to have Will and Patrick's experience as part of the company to allow us to achieve that," noted Rob Rice, VP of Online Operations.

Leverett has worked for the past eleven years in the online game service industry. He has worked on a dozen shipped MMO titles at teams including Origin Systems/Electronic Arts and NCsoft North America.

Bays' experience includes time at Origin Systems, NCsoft and Turbine Entertainment. During his employment at the latter, he helped launch Lord of the Rings Online, ultimately becoming Network Operations Manager, working to ensure minimal downtime for all live services.

"Our developers are making an unbelievable game in APB, it's my job to make sure it's available to our players," said Bays. "As a gamer myself, I don't find 6 or 8 hours downtime every week acceptable, so our system will allow our players to enjoy our games round the clock."

Image Metrics – New Team of Industry Professionals
This past week, Image Metrics announced several key hires with gaming experience. Included among them are Art Santos, who will be European sales manager, with Ric Neil and Eric Peterson joining Gordon Bellamy in the Santa Monica office to improve developer relations. Dario Ahdoot will help develop Image Metrics' performance transfer technology into a solution for film and visual effects studios. Nick Ramsay and Beau Teora will be technical account managers for Europe and North America, respectively.

"We're pleased to add these new team members' valuable expertise in response to Image Metrics' on going growth, including a new facial animation project for SCEA's God of War III video game and signing Double Negative as our first self-service performance transfer beta client," said Michael Starkenburg, Image Metrics CEO. "Our new team members all possess a deep understanding of the unique workflow challenges our customers face when creating games and visual effects. Their unrivaled experience in helping to develop successful products will enable our customers to tell better stories through believable facial animation."

Bigpoint.com – Expanding Board
Bigpoint.com announced recently that it would be bringing Simon Guild on as Chairman of the Board. He will advise the browser-based game company on its international expansion.

"Simon Guild, with his broad media experience, will support us and advise us in our internationalization plans. Bigpoint grew by over 4,500 percent in the last few years," says Heiko Hubertz, CEO Bigpoint GmbH. "With the investment from NBC Universal and GMT last year, we are now taking the next step."

Guild was President and CEO of MTV Networks Europe until 2006. There, he was responsible for the European expansion of the company's range of brands such as MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central.

"I am proud to be able to support such a young and successful company. The innovative browser games that Bigpoint is developing and distributing have enormous international market potential," explains Guild. "Together with Heiko Hubertz and his highly motivated team, we will continue to expand in the future."

Music Mogul – Five Executives
Music Mogul announced this past week that they have added five executives to their organization
Bob Aniello will be Chief Operating Officer, responsible for all operations pertaining to the music world. Rick Berger has been named Vice President of Advertising Sales, where he will develop brand integration programs for advertisers while working with Vivienne Bosch, who is now Vice President of Promotions. Courtney Taylor is now Vice President of Corporate Development & Strategic Alliances and will be responsible for developing strategic partnerships between Music Mogul and third-party organizations, while Jeremy Monroe will work as Director of Content and Monetization, designing and implementing a virtual world experience and revenue generating business model while handling new branded products, traffic retention strategies and revenue generating opportunities for Music Mogul's online music network.

"These additions to the Music Mogul team are a perfect example of our strategy to unite the best minds from the worlds of gaming and music," said Nicholas Longano, CEO and founder of Music Mogul. "They bring a wealth of experience in these industries to our organization, and will be of tremendous importance as we bring to market this exciting and innovative new platform for star search, music discovery and music lifestyle experience."

Aniello has over two decades of experience in emerging technology, gaming and interactive fields. He worked for EA, creating the EA Sports BIG brand and the CyberScan gaming system. Aniello later served in Vice President of marketing positions for Jamdat and Mattel Digital Play division and was most recently Senior Vice President of THQ, where he was responsible for all strategic planning, product development, and marketing.

Berger has also worked two decades in account management, media, sales, and brand management. He worked for two agencies on campaigns for Oil of Olay, Bain de Soleil and "Friends don't let friends drive drunk" while also launching several products at L'Oreal. Berger joined Next Generation Radio in 1996, a youth radio industry new business initiative, becoming President in 1998. He later joined Alloy Media & Marketing in 2007 as VP Sales and managed the NY Sales force through 2009.

Bosch has over fifteen years of experience as a consumer product goods executive . She began at Goldman, Sachs & Co., later managing product and promotion programs for Revlon Inc., L'Oreal USA, and Unilever. Bosch then worked at Clinique Laboratories as Global Director for Makeup Marketing and then Director of Skincare Marketing and Sales Development at Clarins USA, leading strategic business and promotion development plans. Later, she was Vice President of Marketing at DDF, managing global marketing, online, public relations, and creative and sales education departments, developing a new point of difference positioning platform for advertising and brand sales while also planning strategic marketing plans prior to the sale of the company to Procter & Gamble.

Taylor has a 17-year career in film, television, popular music and philanthropy. She has worked with artists like Bruce Springsteen, Aerosmith, Destiny's Child and John Mayer for Sony Music and with Columbia Tri-Star Television to produce a TV show for Chynna Phillips. Taylor's other clients have included David de Rothschild, Zoe Tryon, Goldman Award recipient Steven Donziger, Sir James Goldsmith's Cuixmala Ecological Foundation, and Twiggy, helping secure the sixties icon a spot on America's Next Top Model. She also led a campaign for Marks and Spencer in the U.K., a clothing line in Japan and a book deal in Europe. Taylor then founded Fastlane in 2002, operating Gulfstream jets between Los Angeles and New York. She currently acts as a Business Development and Strategic Alliance consultant for former Epic Records President Charlie Walk and the multi-media company CWE Media.

Monroe has extensive knowledge in the online gaming landscape, with a dozen years as a project manager and software development producer for several international firms including Accenture, Nortel Networks, Vodafone, CFC, Disney Interactive and Activision. He was most recently at virtual world giant Sulake as Director of Marketing and Business Development for the their North American operations.