New sales team for Thumbstar

Thumbstar Games has appointed two new executives. Tony Fitzgerald will act as sales manager while Phil Brannelly will take the role of marketing manager.

"The pace of growth at Thumbstar continues and both Tony and Phil bring many years of experience into the fold," said CEO Gareth Edmondson.

"That sort of experience is priceless for any company, such as ours, with big ambitions. They are a welcome addition to the team."

The expansion should come as no surprise. Until recently Thumbstar focused on publishing, with 2000 games, but now plans to develop its own mobile IP.

Brannelly boasts experience with GAME and Ubisoft, where he managed the Tom Clancy franchise.

"Thumbstar are already well established as a distributor of 3rd party mobile games content but the creation of our own IP, and taking that to a highly competitive market, is very exciting," he said.

"Everyone involved with Thumbstar has one goal and that's to be the best. I'm thrilled to be given the chance to be a part of it."

Fitzgerald has built his experience in the mobile and gaming sectors with companies like Psygnosis, Rage, Jester Interactive, and Telcogames.

"I am delighted to have joined Thumbstar Games at such an exciting stage in the company's development," he added.

"We have ambitious growth plans, but with an extremely broad and diverse catalogue, and with established routes to market, we are well positioned to succeed and become a world leader in the provision of mobile games content."

Thumbstar recently made headlines with Edmondson's move into the top role, after he left Driver studio Reflections after 14 years. In a recent interview with GamesIndustry.biz he spoke about Thumbstar's decision to start developing its own titles.

"The strategy we have is develop our own stuff, in terms of IP creation which will be exclusive to us, which in turn will help grow the publishing side. And with high quality content we can offer that to networks and so on."