Vanguard Entertainment Group launch
New studio established by Guerrilla founders Martin de Ronde and Michiel Mol; first project to be announced shortly.
Amsterdam, The Netherlands. 15 September 2010. Four years after selling Guerrilla to Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE), original co-founders Martin de Ronde and Michiel Mol have reunited to form Vanguard Entertainment Group.
Vanguard Entertainment Group merges the properties and expertise in de Ronde and Mol’s company Karami, an executive production company in the field of online games, and W! Games, developer of PSN and XBLA titles such as the recently released and critically acclaimed Greed Corp.
The merger between both parties will allow for the creation of a new breed of online games for consoles and other premium gaming platforms, taking the fundamental mechanics of the fast growing market of PC online games and applying them to products for consoles and other premium platforms.
“Over the past few years, we have been closely following the rapid rise of social network games, browser based games and new online business models associated with these platforms. We also see that the market for console games forms the heart of our industry still in terms of revenue and state of the art production values. We feel both these market segments will be rapidly converging over the coming years, rather than competing with each other, and with Vanguard we want to be at the forefront of this development. It will be Vanguard’s mission to capitalize on the need for new types of online content on consoles, which it will be doing with games based on original IP,” stated Martin de Ronde, Vanguard Entertainment Group’s new Chief Commercial Officer.
Vanguard is currently working on several new projects, with the first due to be announced shortly.
Media Enquiries:
Alison Beasley, Lincoln Beasley PR.
M: +44 (0) 7966 449130 E: Alison@lincolnbeasley.co.uk
About Michiel Mol
Michiel Mol is a talented e-businessman and no stranger to the gaming industry. At 23, after his graduation from Leiden University with a degree in both Computer Science and Mathematics, he founded his own company Lost Boys International (LBi) which quickly became Europe’s largest digital agency and is currently listed on both the Dutch and Swedish stock exchanges. Michiel then went on to found two more companies in the digital world: Media Republic and Guerrilla Games, thus getting involved in cross media and gaming. After the sale of Guerrilla to Sony Computer Entertainment Europe in 2005, Michiel continued his involvement in innovative projects. Currently, he is a member of the supervisory board at LBi (and its largest shareholder), is co-owner and board member of the ForceIndia Formula One Team, which he founded together with Indian business mogul Vijay Mallya (of Kingfisher) and is involved in several start-ups, most notably Karami. At Vanguard, Michiel will fulfill the role of strategy advisor, sharing his knowledge of and passion for technology, high-tech innovations and gaming.
About Martin de Ronde
Martin de Ronde began his career in the games industry over 15 years ago as a PR manager and later as development manager in publishing. He founded his own development studio in 1998, which he sold to multimedia conglomerate Lost Boys a year later. Here, De Ronde became co-founder and managing director of Lost Boys Games. The studio became independent in 2001 and was renamed Guerrilla Games and was subsequently sold to Sony Computer Entertainment Europe in 2005. As commercial director De Ronde witnessed the birth of PlayStation 2 hit Killzone. In 2006 he departed to founded charitable publisher OneBigGame. In 2009 he founded Karami together with Michiel Mol. At Vanguard, Martin will fulfill the role of Chief Commercial Officer.
About W!Games
W!Games is a multiplatform development studio located in the heart of Amsterdam dedicated to the creation of downloadable, innovative, high-end games. The studio’s current projects are created using the in-house multiplatform ‘Blue’ engine and are based on the company’s original Mistbound IP. The studio employs 40 talented and experienced developers covering all platforms and genres.