Elie Akilian — Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Elie founded KingsIsle Entertainment in January 2005. Elie brings a wealth of business management experience to KingsIsle, and an approach that fosters creativity. He is focused on attracting top talent, pushing their creative boundaries and challenging them to excel.
Prior to KingsIsle, Elie co-founded Inet Technologies, Inc. in 1989, and took the company public in 1999. He served as its President and Chief Executive Officer from April 1999 until the sale of the company to Tektronix, Inc., in September 2004. Prior to becoming CEO of Inet Technologies, Elie served as its Executive Vice President responsible for product development and then as Executive Vice President of sales and marketing.
David Nichols — President and Chief Operating Officer
David has a wide variety of experience in operations, publishing, and financial management which he brings to KingsIsle. In addition to his financial background, he possesses an in-depth understanding and knowledge of the video game industry.
Prior to joining KingsIsle, David was with Midway Games Inc., and subsidiaries from 1995 to 2004. Most recently, he served as Midway's Senior Vice President - Administration and Operations from January 2002 to November 2004. Prior to that, he served in various management roles with Midway's wholly-owned subsidiary, Midway Home Entertainment Inc., from June 1995 to January 2002, including Executive Vice President - Operations.
Mike strengthens KingsIsle with eighteen years of engineering and product development experience and an in-depth knowledge of various networking technologies and systems.
Prior to joining KingsIsle, Mike served as the Chief Technical Officer of the Communication Business of Tektronix, Inc. Mike also served as the CTO of Inet Technologies, Inc. prior to its acquisition by Tektronix, Inc. in 2004. Mike began his service with Inet in 1990, and prior to assuming the CTO role, he served as Vice President, Diagnostics Products Division and in various other critical roles, including Vice President of Research & Development for telecommunications software platforms.
Fred brings a broad range of marketing and analytical skills to KingsIsle. In his career he has held senior positions in Marketing and Consulting and has developed a specific focus in online brands.
Prior to joining KingsIsle Fred served as Vice President of Marketing for Hoover's, Inc., D&B's online business division. In his leadership role he and his team were responsible for all marketing initiatives including customer acquisition and retention, traffic generation, product marketing, pricing, and on and offline merchandising. From 2001 until 2005 Fred worked in Dell's consumer marketing organization and held positions driving customer retention, as well as managing the P&L for Dell's consumer services business and its $6 billion consumer desktop business. Prior to joining Dell, Fred worked as a Senior Consultant with a strategy consulting company and also spent five years in the financial services business.
Coming from a fifteen year stretch of successful game development, Tom's contribution to KingsIsle is his immensely creative imagination that allows him to envision entire gaming worlds and character designs that are unique in the industry.
Prior to KingsIsle, Tom had co-founded two of the industry's most well known software development studios; id Software and ION Storm. Millions worldwide have enjoyed Tom's games. He has consistently received high praise, excellent reviews, and numerous awards from the gaming press and the Software Publisher's Association.
Over his career he has championed innovation, developed strong characters and stories, and created solid, fun game-play. Among Tom's 45 published games, his flagship titles include the Commander Keen series, Wolfenstein 3D, Spear of Destiny, DOOM, Rise of the Triad and Anachronox. Other credits include Congo Cube, Hyperspace Delivery Boy and most recently, Area 51.
Todd's in-depth knowledge of the online video game business, with additional expertise in sales, marketing and business development make him an outstanding part of the KingsIsle team. Todd has a long history of entrepreneurial endeavors, with product innovation and strategic planning as his strengths.
Most recently, Todd was the President of Wolfpack Studios, Inc., creators of the MMOG title Shadowbane,
until its sale to Ubisoft Entertainment in early 2004. Before becoming Wolfpack's President, he was
their Vice President of Sales and Marketing, responsible for managing the game design team, building
and maintaining their online player community and publisher relations. Prior to Wolfpack Studios, Todd
co-founded, grew and eventually sold Reliant Systems, a technology company, to Compuware Corporation. He
is the creative mind behind KingsIsle’s initial project, Wizard101
Josef's extensive knowledge of the technical challenges relating to the development of massively multiplayer online games provides a valuable addition to the KingsIsle team. In addition to his technical background, he has many years of experience in managing technical teams in entrepreneurial environments.
Prior to joining KingsIsle, Josef followed a long-time dream and co-founded the online game company Wolfpack Studios, Inc. While at Wolfpack, he created a technology platform used in the development of the MMOG title Shadowbane. Josef was involved in all aspects of product design, development, and business operations up until the acquisition of the company by Ubisoft Entertainment. Prior to Wolfpack, Josef developed a Data Migration Engine technology and led a team of technical consultants as Director of Professional Services at Reliant Data Systems.
Robin has more than 15 years of experience in managing technical teams in entrepreneurial environments. He has spent the last 10 years developing web solutions for a variety of environments. As an early entrant into the World Wide Web, Robin has developed a wealth of valuable knowledge in Internet technologies and applications.
Robin began developing web solutions at Vignette, Corporation in 1997, where he was one of the early employees of the company. He was responsible for managing, designing, and personally coding solutions on over 200 of the company's customer web sites - including more than 10 of the 50 busiest web sites in the world.
