Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. today announced that Jack Tretton will step down from his role as President and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) as of March 31, 2014. This is a result of a mutual agreement between Mr. Tretton and SCEA not to renew their contractual relationship.
Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. today announced that Jack Tretton will step down from his role as President and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) as of March 31, 2014. This is a result of a mutual agreement between Mr. Tretton and SCEA not to renew their contractual relationship.
It most mean that "hey get this thing on the road with good press etc. and we will give you shit ton of cash for making it a success" and he goes like "no more need to work " or something along those lines.
I like Jack Tretton, I like what he brings to those sometimes intolerable conferences. I think what I liked is that he IS a professional and just reminded me that it is a business and that is what they are there to do. No shitty fluff and trying to be cool, or "yo I'm a gamer yo" annoying shit, just I'm here because they are paying me and I'm mildly excited about this, just appreciated that about him. He will be missed by me.
And that no DRM mic drop moment last year was great with a very subtitle "and you'll pay for multi now" during the tears of joy.
Kind of crazy, he's been there so long, pretty much since day 1 scea, and he's leaving at an extreme high point for that company, I'll be more interested to find out where he is going.
The only place that makes sense would be EA, but I can't imagine they would boot their current CEO so soon.
Jack was always excellent at the E3 Press Conferences but the 2013 one was just unbelievable... it's one of those moments I'll remember just sitting literally shocked...He was great for Sony and will be missed by them.
I wonder... IIRC, Jeff mentioned there was competition between the European(or maybe he said UK) and American branches of SCE for the vision for the design and development of the PS4 and that the European offices won out in that kinda competition. With that in mind, when Kaz Hirai was promoted and they needed the new SCE President and CEO, Andrew House was chosen for that role(I'm aware AH was there longer than JT and had worked closely with Shuhei earlier) and Jack Tretton decided with that with it unlikely for him to get that role in the near future, he decided to move on but being a great team player he stayed on for the launch.
This is all tinfoil hat kinda stuff, but with that internal debate with SCEE and SCEA about the PS4's design, it seems very plausible.
This all very business-y and I really don't care about that, but Tretton could put on a goddamn show the likes of which Ubisoft could only hope to grasp for.
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I still think he'd win the Reggie-Tretton-Mattrick fight easily.
After so many year you either get given the big-seat (CEO, COO) or you go to the people offering the big seat. Jack Tretton could be CEO, COO of any any bottom-tier Fortune 500 company.
The next step for Jack would have needed to be Shuhei Yoshida's job as President of Sony's Worldwide Studios for Sony ComputerEntertainment Inc or Andrew House's job as Group CEO of SCEI . If Sony was not willing/able to offer that he is really stuck with nowhere to move up.
At the level of executive Jack is you cannot stay still when you have had a huge success. The group at SCEA turned around PS3 and through probably some very hard negotiation got PS4 on the perfect trajectory for sucess. They needed to either 'move him up' or 'let him go' because you either reward such success or you let the guy go to where he can get that reward.
To be sure he will be missed, but really the corporate culture at Sony Computer Entertainment has been breeding very likable, very personable "front men" for years. People liked Ken Kutaragi, he went the wrong direction with PS3...but he was liked in America. People liked Phil Harrison a lot while he was at Sony. People currently like Shuhei Yoshida and Kazuo Hirai. In fact, the worst that can be said about Sony chief executives is some of the native Japanese speakers don't always make 'compelling' speakers at e3 because of translation issues...but they do come across as likable. That corporate culture and that's who they hire, but don't discount the culture created at Sony.
We might never know why Jack is leaving [family, better offers, not being promoted to teh next leve], but my guess is the split is about as amicable as it can be be . He might not go, but Nintendo would be a fool not to send over feelers, and Jack would be a fool to not state his conditions to Nintendo for pay, power, and a say at top levels. (In the end he wouldn't go because Nintendo is not desperate enough...yet.)
I like Jack Tretton, I like what he brings to those sometimes intolerable conferences. I think what I liked is that he IS a professional and just reminded me that it is a business and that is what they are there to do. No shitty fluff and trying to be cool, or "yo I'm a gamer yo" annoying shit, just I'm here because they are paying me and I'm mildly excited about this, just appreciated that about him. He will be missed by me.
And that no DRM mic drop moment last year was great with a very subtitle "and you'll pay for multi now" during the tears of joy.
That's why I like Sony press conferences in general. They just are slicker than the others. Especially Microsoft. Microsoft always tries to have banter between speakers and it never works.
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