As we reported in April, MindJolt, the game distribution company that was acquired by MySpace founder and former CEO Chris DeWolfe, bought Social Gaming Network (SGN). SGN’s founder Shervin Pishevar recently announced his move to the venture world, joining Menlo Ventures as a partner. Today MindJolt is announcing a new head of SGN’s social mobile game development studio—seasoned mobile vet Ulf Waschbusch.
For background, SGN creates a number of popular games for iPhone and Android devices and social platforms like Facebook. SGN’s hit online and mobile games (which have seen 30 million downloads to date), include Mini Tycoon Casino, F.A.S.T., and Skies of Glory. MindJolt bought SGN to create a cross-platform game distribution empire, and SGN brought a solid set of mobile titles and technology and a number of talented engineers.
Waschbusch has held senior mobile product roles for Google, MySpace and T-Mobile, most recently serving as Chief Product Officer at Garena, one of the largest gaming community platforms with more than 60-million registered users.
At Google, he was Mobile Marketing Product Manager. As a sidenote, back in 2008, Waschbusch publicly criticized Google’s Android platform. He claimed phone’s physical design hasn’t changed in 2.5 years, and called it ‘ugly and old fashioned.’
And of course, DeWolfe has prior experience working with Waschbusch at MySpace, where he helped lead mobile product development.
Mobile is definitely a key component of DeWolfe’s strategy for MindJolt’s expansion. In April, DeWolfe told us that the gaming studio would be partnering with with movie studios and entertainment companies to create cross-platform branded, game titles. As gaming on smartphones heats up, mobile is a big part of this plan.