GC Developers Conference 2008

GC Developers Conference (GCDC)

(August 18th to 20th, 2008)

LEIPZIG, Germany - July 11th 2008 - The Leipziger Messe today announced additional speakers for the GC Developers Conference (GCDC) 2008 to be held August 18th-20th, 2008 in Leipzig, Germany. This year, Europe's leading developers conference includes speakers such as LEGO Group's Henrik Lorensen, Michael Capps of Epic Games, Leigh Davis of Intel, Kay Gruenwoldt of Nokia, and Steve Meretzky of Blue Fang Games.

Henrik Lorensen, Vice President of Business Development of the LEGO Group, will draw on the LEGO Group's experience with bringing their traditional, physical LEGO brick play experience into an online environment, to inspire other companies to evolve their brands in a way that makes sense for the community. In the speech, "Bringing a Classic Brand Online", Lorensen will utilize his expertise in business development to offer valuable insight into how brands can intelligently expand online, using LEGO Universe and the company's other online initiatives as examples. He will also discuss how LEGO Universe fits into the overall business strategy, outlining the LEGO Group's current digital portfolio which includes LEGO Factory, My LEGO Network, and the award-winning LEGO.de.

Michael Capps, President of Epic Games, will give a keynote about Gears of War 2 development. Leigh Davis, Senior Applications Engineer at Intel will give insight into developing video games on DirectX with his lecture, "Driving DirectX in a Parallel World." The conference will also welcome Kay Gruenwoldt, Head of Title Marketing at Nokia, as one of the speakers.

Steve Meretzky, Senior Designer at Blue Fang Games, has identified an issue within the games industry developing games that appeal widely to teens and young adult males. In his speech entitled, "A culture of innovation," he will tackle the problem of making games that truly appeal to the masses.

This year's GC Developers Conference features speakers from several branches including game developers, hardware developers, mobile phone manufacturers, lawyers, and public relations and marketing experts who will present over 40 lectures.

A list of the speakers who have already been confirmed is available at the GCDC-website: http://www.gcdc.eu/index.php?page=907.

GC Developers Conference has established itself internationally and today it is not only the most important event for game development in Europe, but also one of the most important conferences for the industry worldwide. GCDC is expected to attract even more professionals from the field in 2008 than last year. For more information about GCDC please visit: http://www.gcdc.eu .

GCDC 2007 Retrospective

In 2007, GCDC was attended by 940 conference participants from 37 countries. Among the speakers were Bob Bates (USA, Legendary Game Designer and Writer), Julian Eggebrecht (USA, Factor 5), Tim Schafer (USA, Double Fine), Bruce Shelley (USA, Ensemble Studios), and Brian Sullivan (USA, Iron Lore Entertainment).

Media Contacts:

Europe

Robert Koestner, Press Department

+49 (0) 341 - 678 8183

r.koestner@leipziger-messe.de

North America

Sean Kauppinen, TriplePoint

+1 415-955-8500

sean@triplepointpr.com

Contact GCDC:

Sponsors, speakers and participants:

Frank Sliwka, Project Director

+49 (0) 341 - 678 8288

f.sliwka@leipziger-messe.de

GCDC on the internet:

http://www.gcdc.eu