IGDA backs down on China GDC row

Following legal pressure from Think Services on the organiser of the LOGIN conference to dissolve its partnership with Howell Expo's copyright-infringing China GDC event in July, the IGDA has now followed suit and deleted any reference to the developer conference from its website.

The organisation had previously noted that its members were able to take advantage of a 10 per cent discount for the event, but that has now been removed - although the savings will still apply to Howell's other property, ChinaJoy.

Despite that, Howell's website still lists the IGDA as a partner for the developer conference, an event which has triggered the anger of Think Services over the ownership of the GDC brand.

Think will be running its own GDC China event in Shanghai in October and recently announced that around 1000 of the 17,000 delegates attending its San Francsico event were from Asia.

"Given the region's critical contributions to game development and the burgeoning opportunities for industry growth there, we are very pleased to see such strong representation by developers across Asia at the GDC," said event director Meggan Scavio. "We are even more excited to further support their education by bringing back the definitive Chinese developer event presented by Chinese game developers for Chinese game developers via GDC China this October."

Howell Expo meanwhile contends the ownership rights of the GDC brand in China, while both organisations boast the support of the government.