Steve Perlman
Latest
An inside view of the WebTV revolution that didn't happen
You might think it should have happened sooner. This week, Microsoft announced it would decommission its MSN TV (formerly WebTV) service. Even I didn't think it would last this long, and I was WebTV's greatest advocate back in the day. In fact, I was its official evangelist, hired by founder Steve Perlman and his company's PR agency as WebTV's national media spokesperson for a period leading up to and including the product launch. In 1996, WebTV was tech's hottest startup, considered a blazing harbinger of the future, all for pretty good reasons. WebTV was primarily an internet popularization play during an era of widespread uncertainty about computers in the home and the value of being online. If tablets and smartphones represent a Steve Jobs-ordained post-PC era, WebTV can be seen in retrospect as a pre-PC computing category. In my view, it isn't modern web-connected TVs that finally killed WebTV (MSN TV) -- it's the mobile revolution that did it.
OnLive's year-long road to recovery involves more partnerships
Bruce Grove, general manager of OnLive in the UK, revealed a 12-month "recovery plan" for the company in an interview with MCV UK. The plan involves building more partnerships to expand the service's reach, though Grove didn't specify who the company would partner with in the future."We have a road map for how soon we start with certain things, what the focus is, what we're going to be doing, what the next twelve months will be. And that's a big shift for the company: Having a 12-month plan," Grove said. "That's something that's going to show how we'll build this into a long-term sustainable business."OnLive went through a rocky period of transition before former CEO Steve Perlman left the company in August. The company cut 50 percent of its staff prior to spinning off into a new company entirely while maintaining the OnLive brand and service."In the past we've been very focused on OnLive being the driving force of wherever we've gone. Now, it's much more about engagement with our partners. That's going to be the way we reach the new customer market," Grove said.
More OnLive management moves: Perlman out, as investor Lauder settles for Chairman
As the OnLive storm continues to ride itself out, details of who the winners and losers are (mainly losers) keep washing up on the shore. Today's casualty seems to be CEO Steve Perlman himself, who -- just days after the firm reinventing itself -- is "departing to work on his myriad of other projects." In his place the former COO, Charlie Jablonski, is temporarily taking the reins, as well as continuing his role as head of operations in the new organization. Finally, completing this wave of announcements, is the news that chief investor, Gary lauder, will officially take the title of Chairman. So, as the new incarnation settles into its new structure, we'll just have to sit tight, waiting to see what the next chapter in the OnLive story is.
OnLive founder, CEO Steve Perlman exiting company; silent investor new chairman
eOnLive CEO and head Steve Perlman is exiting the cloud streaming company, according to a press release, just days after he was reaffirmed as its leader. The company's former operations head Charlie Jablonski is taking over as chief operating officer and will act as interim chief executive officer, while venture capitalist Gary Lauder – and new owner of OnLive – becomes OnLive's new leader."Steve has created an extraordinary company that no one else could have created. He is a unique entrepreneur and deserves his legendary status in Silicon Valley as a creator of groundbreaking companies," Lauder said of Perlman. Lauder asserted that, "the new OnLive is emerging with greater financial security and a brighter outlook on the future. OnLive is now positioned to execute against longer-term projects with our breakthrough technology, products, and services."The release doesn't say where Perlman's going just yet, only that he's "departing to work on his myriad other projects," presumably in reference to Mova, and his original startup, Rearden. It does, however, note that Lauder "plans to continue building the OnLive management team in key categories as the company delivers on its mission of breaking new ground in cloud gaming."
Steve Perlman remains OnLive CEO in company rebirth
OnLive CEO Steve Perlman is retaining his position as chief operating officer of the cloud gaming service, despite over half of his employees losing their jobs when the company shut down. OnLive amassed debts of over $30 million, but was acquired by Lauder Partners, LLC with the company's new owner assuring there is "solid financial footing."Perlman's continuance as CEO was revealed in a letter from Lauder Partners to the OnLive Fans community. The letter also details that Perlman received no stock in the newly formed OnLive company, nor did he receive any compensation as part of the transaction.During the original OnLive's final staff meeting last week, Perlman blamed himself for the demise of the company, making today's news all the more bizarre. "I'm the one that brought you here. I'm the one that ultimately made decisions. And I'm the one that ultimately takes responsibility. So I am sorry, and it didn't end up exactly as we'd hoped," he told the company's 150-200 person staff. Perlman's history beyond OnLive includes high-ranking positions at both Apple and Microsoft.
OnLive sells company, lays off about 50% of staff
Just in case you didn't hear over the weekend, the cloud computing service OnLive experienced a little bit of a crisis: On Friday morning, the CEO of the company spoke to staff to essentially tell them all that they were fired, and that the assets of the company were being bought by another investor. The good news here is that the OnLive service hasn't gone down at all, and it reportedly isn't going down any time soon. But the bad news is that many of OnLive's employees have lost their jobs, and any investments in the company's potential future that they might have had. What does this mean for those of us on Mac and iOS? Right now, not much -- both OnLive's gaming service and the OnLive Desktop service (which provides a free streaming Windows computer and Microsoft apps) are still working just fine. The former employees of OnLive went through a rough situation, and for that reason you may not want to support a company like this going forward, but if you've come to depend on either one of those services, you're fine for now. The future of the company is definitely in question, or at least more question than it was before. Some of the news coming out of the whole event says that OnLive averaged only about 1800 users, which would make the service much smaller than anyone had thought. CEO Steve Perlman also reportedly has turned down previous offers to buy the company, instead hoping that OnLive's patents and other assets would eventually be worth much more. OnLive showed us an iOS app at one point, and even released an actual Bluetooth controller to work with the iPad, but while the company has released an Android app, it's never been able to get the iOS version approved. There is still an OnLive Desktop app on the store, but that gaming version wasn't ever released. We'll see how the company comes out of this situation going forward -- if things don't get any better for OnLive, this could end up being a service that simply arrived before its time.
OnLive's mysterious benefactor revealed, 'almost half' of original staff hired on at new company
Venture capitalist group Lauder Partners, LLC – helmed by long-time tech investor Gary Lauder – is the group behind OnLive's new incarnation. OnLive representatives announced this morning that Lauder Partners' Gary Lauder is the "very accomplished and well known venture capitalist" that's helping bail out the cloud streaming service. CEO Steve Perlman spoke of Lauder in vague terms during the company's final meeting late last week.The new company will retain "almost half" of the original staff – OnLive employed approximately 150-200 during its height, and laid off over half of its employes last week when it declared a form of bankruptcy (ABC). Said employees will retain their current salary level in the new company; executives are said to be receiving "reduced compensation" from the transaction (as to retain more employees), and CEO Steve Perlman is apparently receiving nothing from the transaction. It's unclear why any executives would be receiving compensation from the transaction in a moment where so many staff are being let go.OnLive reaffirmed that "users should see no change in the OnLive Game or Desktop Services," and that "all of their purchases remain intact and available." The announcement also provided updated stats on OnLive's userbase, which "has over 2.5 million subscribers, with an active base of over 1.5 million subscribers."Update: OnLive tells us that the original company had "about 200 employees" (including temps) when the ABC process began last week, and "almost half had offers in hand at full salary when we made the transition." The rep also said OnLive "expect to get more offers out this week," and that it's "just a matter of processing the transition."
OnLive's alternative to bankruptcy: just what is an Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors?
The news is out. OnLive, Inc. is no more, having cut the bulk of its workforce loose and used an Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors (ABC) to absolve itself of massive debts incurred by the expansion of its services without a corresponding increase in its customer base. But what is this alternative to filing for bankruptcy, and why did OnLive choose this particular legal reset button to start over? We spoke with an expert on the matter, Martin Pichinson, co-founder and managing member of Sherwood Partners (which does two or three ABCs in a given week), to help educate us on this little-known tool used by companies irrevocably in the red.
Documenting the death of OnLive: notes from the company's final meeting
"I've been a non-stop fundraising machine," OnLive CEO Steve Perlman told his entire staff yesterday morning. "And I finally got to the point where I just could not bring in enough funding to carry this thing forward." The hundreds of employees that make up OnLive were – en masse – relieved of their positions in yesterday's meeting, including Perlman himself. "All of us, technically, as of today, our jobs have ended – our current jobs with this company," another administrator informed the crowd after Perlman finished speaking.OnLive is entering what is known in California as an "Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors," or an "ABC," (a form of bankruptcy) wherein an "assignee" (a person, persons, or entity) takes over the assets of the current company – in OnLive's case, this means "the software, hardware, network architecture, our logo, all that stuff," according to Perlman – in an effort to lighten the previous company's debts and get its creditors paid off. Thus the "Benefit of Creditors" part of that acronym.Perlman didn't say who that assignee was during the company's meeting, only referring to him as "an extraordinary guy" (not an entity), and a "very accomplished and well known venture capitalist" who is "very wealthy." The unknown assignee apparently believes that OnLive "is the entire future of everything," Perlman told employees. Unfortunately, he isn't wealthy enough to bring on the 150-200 people that OnLive employed."Here's the tough part, and this is the thing I'm very sorry to say: it's just not possible for one individual in a startup – whether it's that old startup or this new startup – to bring in this many people into a company," Perlman said. Without giving numbers, Perlman said that, in the new company, "the people that come on board are the essential people, as needed, to go and accomplish that goal of getting this thing to cash-flow positive."He prefaced that news with a stinging reality: "The people that are gonna be coming on board here, that will come out of the group ... I'm gonna tell you, most of the people will not be coming on board."
Source: OnLive averaged 1800 concurrent users, CEO promised to protect patents against Gaikai [update]
A source confirmed to have been affected by today's OnLive company shift has stepped forward, telling Joystiq that staff were shocked when company CEO Steve Perlman announced OnLive would be restructured. Employees had joked, before the 10am meeting, that perhaps the company had finally been purchased. They thought the news would be good. It wasn't. Our source, who wished to remain anonymous, said that Perlman "showed no remorse" when detailing the decision to staff and explained to laid-off employees that any vetted stocks were worthless – as OnLive is "nowhere near going public" – no severance would be offered, and all flexible spending accounts were gone. [See update below] At 2pm today, a second meeting was called for employees that received an offer letter to remain with the restructured company, under an undisclosed investor. Only those with offer letters know the company behind the move, our source said. Prior to the news, OnLive employed 180 to 200 individuals. Less than fifty percent of staff – and our source speculates closer to twenty percent – received an invitation to the new company. Employees that remained included management and select members of the operations and engineering teams required to keep the service moving forward. Despite its claim of two million users, our source says that the average peak amount of concurrent users was around 1,800. The two million number accounts for anyone who has signed up for the service; actual usage was remarkably lower. Following the meeting, management told laid-off staff to pack their belongings, return any key cards, and exit the building by 4pm today. When reporters were spotted photographing the building, management requested laid-off employees to exit through the garage and not the front door. Multiple offers were made to purchase the company over the last few months, including one from Hewlett-Packard. Company management said it was investigating offers; however, it was widely known to employees that Perlman was looking for an offer in the range of $1 billion. "Steve got all excited when Gaikai got acquired, because it kind of validated everything we did," our source told us when asked if Sony's acquisition of the streaming service company changed an attitude in the office. At around the same time Sony made the acquisition, OnLive's patent for gameplay streaming went through. "So all of a sudden, Steve was like 'When the time is right, we're going to hit them with our patent because we're not going to let some two-bit company ride our coattails,'" the source claimed, explaining the threat was made to the entire company soon after Gaikai was acquired. "I guarantee that some time in the future, Steve is going to go to court and sue the shit out of them for stealing our ideas," the source said. Joystiq has contacted OnLive regarding the allegation of a potential patent scuffle. Update: Joystiq has learned that laid-off employees will keep their benefits package until the end of August, with the option of opting into COBRA on September 1. Additionally, laid-off employees that aid in the transition to the new investor, may be rewarded in company stock; however, it should be noted that OnLive is still not a publicly traded company. In separate meetings, laid-off OnLive employees received a termination package, which included a check for their last week of work and approved, unpaid PTO. Update 2: Though the new owner of OnLive has yet to be revealed, the new investor appears to be an individual "impressed" with what OnLive has been able to accomplish and not a major company – this according to Perlman during today's internal announcement meeting. Update 3: Another source has come forward to dispute the claim that OnLive CEO Steve Perlman showed "no remorse" when announcing the company's restructuring. "Steve said he was very, very sorry and shouldered all the blame at the company meeting this morning," the new source – also requesting to remain anonymous, but confirmed as an employee – told Joystiq. "Steve has always worked harder than anyone at OnLive and therefore has my respect as well as many others within the company," the sourced, who was also let go this morning, added. We have changed our headline address this conflict. Have any additional information about today's OnLive restructuring? Please contact xav [at] joystiq [dot] com.
OnLive spun off into new company, service 'will continue to operate'
Cloud streaming business OnLive confirmed its sale and subsequent restructuring "into a newly formed company" this afternoon, and said both its game and desktop services "will continue to operate." That includes "all of OnLive's apps and devices."According to the statement, OnLive, Inc. is now a new company "backed by substantial funding" – enough funding to hire "a large percentage of OnLive, Inc.'s staff across all departments." Furthermore, there are plans to "hire substantially more people, including additional OnLive employees." The statement also said that its various plans for the future, including "products and services" that are still in development, will be unaffected by the spin off.The statement doesn't address how many employees were affected by today's news. Reports from former employees put the layoff numbers at 50 percent or more of OnLive's total staff.When asked whether CEO Steve Perlman was still heading the company, an OnLive rep confirmed that the company's management team "remains intact."
Source: OnLive undergoing buyout in wake of dire financials, laying off 'at least 50 percent' of staff
After a lot of back and forth from the rumor mill and official OnLive channels, we now have what we believe to be a far clearer view of precisely what is happening right now at OnLive headquarters in Palo Alto. We've spoken with a (now former) employee of the gaming service who ran down today's events for us. According to the account, a meeting was held at OnLive's offices at 10AM this morning, wherein the company's CEO announced a massive staff layoff -- at least 50 percent of the staff, according to our source's numbers. The layoffs come as part of across the board cuts to the company, and all those out of a job will have their key cards deactivated as of 4PM local time today. The source was understandably baffled by the abruptness of the news, along with the added blow that no severance will be offered and stock holdings are essentially worth nothing. The move apparently comes as OnLive is being purchased by an unknown party. Those being kept on have reportedly received offer letters from the new company. Why the sudden move? The source believes it may have something to do with the company's massive operating costs, which we're told are around $5 million a month. Certainly those concerns line up with a story dug up by Kotaku highlighting the company's plans to file for Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors as a result of the company's troubled financial situation. We're still gathering information as to the nature of the buyout. Update: According to our source, the writing wasn't on the wall at the company per se, but OnLive had reportedly been entertaining acquisition offers ahead of the news from companies including HP. Update 2: Our source has offered up some additional information on the matter, putting the average concurrent user number for the service at 1,100 to 1,500, peaking at around 1,800 on a given day -- not exceptional by any means in the face of reported $5 million a month operating costs. The number of layoffs, meanwhile, may well be greater than originally suggested, with our source putting the number of employees staying on board at around 10 to 20 percent.
Source: OnLive losing 'at least 50 percent of staff,' bought out by unknown third party
OnLive let go "at least 50 percent" of its staff today, Engadget learned, and the company was purchased by an unknown third party. A former employee confirmed layoff reports that popped up earlier this afternoon and recounted the events that led to today's firings.A meeting held this morning by CEO Steve Perlman informed employees that "at least 50 percent of the staff" were to be cut, effective as of 4PM PST today. Employees affected in the layoffs are said to have not been offered severance.Moreover, OnLive was bought out by an unknown third party, and an unknown amount of employees will be offered jobs at the newly formed company. It's unclear why OnLive is suddenly shedding so many employees, but the former employee pointed out monthly operating costs of approximately $5 million as at least part of the reason.For its part, OnLive isn't confirming any layoffs. "We don't respond to rumors, but of course not," a company rep told Joystiq earlier today regarding reports that the company's entire staff was laid off. Reps wouldn't confirm whether other layoffs have occurred.Vizio's Co-Star player is the latest product featuring OnLive – it's unclear how, if at all, it will be affected by today's layoffs, not to mention the purchase of OnLive by a third party.
OnLive releases iOS and Android apps, custom touch controls, and a wireless controller
Cloud gaming service OnLive has been up and running for about a year now, and in all that time it's been doing exactly what many gamers thought impossible: Playing high resolution games over the Internet on any computer powerful enough to run a simple streaming app. Now, the company is taking its cloud-based show to smartphones and tablets, with a whole suite of apps available this week for Android and iOS devices. Joystiq had a chance to chat with OnLive CEO Steve Perlman, and he told us how the company has brought OnLive's library of PC and console titles to touchscreens everywhere (with the help of developers like Rockstar Games and a brand new controller), how OnLive and its service compares to the Xbox 360 console, and how his company would rather play nice with traditional console makers like Microsoft and Sony than disrupt their current business models.
OnLive's Deus Ex pack-in code is 'Cloud game meets physical media 1.0'
People buying new PC copies of Deus Ex: Human Revolution this week have likely been delighted to find codes for the OnLive version of the game in the box (unless they bought those copies from GameStop). But you can't play the same save file between the PC and OnLive versions, making the offer more of a cool novelty than something immediately useful to players. OnLive CEO Steve Perlman told Joystiq that this offer, the "first of many," is just a tentative step by OnLive. "You can think of this as cloud game meets physical media 1.0," he said. "This first version doesn't have cross-pollination between your local PC and the cloud." The main issue preventing this from being done right now -- preventing, say, OnLive cloud saving for retail games -- might surprise you: mods. Perlman said that since OnLive uses slightly different versions of the game than the retail PC, if any kind of alteration is done to the base game, it could cause compatibility issues between the versions. Cloud saving on OnLive "can be done," he said. "It requires more thought than printing a code." He affirmed that OnLive will do that, but "that'll probably be like 2.0." OnLive is planning not only to solve that issue, but to allow for mods in the streaming versions of games. "I think if everyone wants to do multiplayer where everyone has auto-aim, that's fine, but you don't want to mix games, you know?" He describes setting up rooms in which people can choose to play with mods. "This is all work that was done many months ago," Perlman noted about the pack-in code, slyly contrasting the lead time required for a retail product with OnLive's instant-on nature. He then laughed. "Oh, my god!"
OnLive adds parental controls, group chat, Facebook achievement posting today
Fear not, there's some good news to report about OnLive today as well. CEO Steve Perlman told Joystiq about three new features that are live on the cloud-gaming service ... right now. Group voice chat allows users to specify "groups" of people, and maintain persistent chat sessions with them, even when they're playing different games, accessing menus, etc. It's even possible to send out an email from within the service inviting group members to chat. Second, parental controls will allow parents to set limits on the content their kids can play, along ESRB or PEGI lines, with the potential to fine-tune to allow individual games (in the case of, say, unrated indie games). "With a different account, if [parents] want," Perlman explained, "they can actually watch the kid playing, and chat with the kid, and so on." He clarified that, since the parent would presumably be in control of the child's account in the first place, a parent can limit spectating and chat to "friends." Finally, it's now possible for achievements to automatically post to a user's Facebook wall. OnLive will automatically record the ten seconds of gameplay up to that achievement, and post it as an HD "Brag Clip." "Facebook has been terrific to work on with this," Perlman said. "They actually made a couple of mods to their system -- because we're the first guys posting HD resolution videos nonstop over to Facebook. They're into it."
OnLive crosses the pond, lands in the UK September 22nd
OnLive's done pretty well here in the States, and we knew it would eventually venture across the ocean to merry old England. But, we didn't know exactly when it would bring its streaming services, MicroConsole and catalog of over 100 titles to the UK. Well, turns out it'll make the transatlantic trip on September 22nd, just in time for the 2011 Eurogamer Expo in London -- so there's just over a month to ready yourself for gaming-anywhere awesomeness. If you're among those interested in being the first of the Queen's subjects using the service that day, hit the source link below to sign up.
OnLive CEO reveals 'entirely new approach' to wireless, credits Rearden for toppling Shannon's Law
"In advance, yes -- you're right, it's impossible. But nonetheless, we have ten radios all working at the same frequency, all at the Shannon limit... and there's no interference." You may not fully grok the significance of that statement, but anyone heavily involved in solving the wireless bandwidth crisis is probably dropjawed. For a little background, there's a perceived limit in wireless known as Shannon's Law, which largely explains why no one can watch a YouTube clip on their EVO at Michigan Stadium. For whatever reason, it's been assumed that this law was fundamentally unbreakable, but it looks as if an unlikely member of society may have just overrode expectations. OnLive's CEO Steve Perlman recently revealed a breakthrough from Rearden Companies -- in short, they've figured out a workaround, and in testing, it's doing things like "removing dead zones" altogether. His slide, shown during a presentation at Columbia, notes that the implications here are "profound," and we couldn't agree more. Do yourself a solid and hit play in the video below the break -- we've fast-forwarded to where this section begins.
OnLive Player App for iPad and Android brings tablet/TV integration, ala Wii U
Cloud gaming poster child OnLive took the opportunity at E3 to show off its tablet-bound OnLive Player application, coming to both iPad and Android devices "later this year," while providing "far higher performance, richer gameplay and deeper social integration than any console announced for 2012." Yeah, that's a not-so-subtle dig at the Wii U. While the OnLive Viewer app currently available doesn't allow for actually playing OnLive on a tablet, the upcoming Player app "will enable gameplay of virtually all OnLive games on an iPad and Android tablet with touch or OnLive's new Universal Wireless Controller." Demoed in the video below is Ubisoft's From Dust, which accepts touch-based input on the tablet applications. Even more notable, considering Nintendo's latest console announcement, is news that the OnLive Player app will allow "the tablet to be used as a touch and motion controller combined with an HDTV (or PC/Mac if preferred)." The tablet can even enable "both synchronized or independent video on the tablet and HDTV screen, enabling combined gameplay with tablet and HDTV" or, more like the concepts we saw of Wii U, "separate gameplay on tablet and HDTV." Take a tour with OnLive prez Steve Perlman after the break; we'll stop by OnLive's E3 booth tomorrow for a tour of our own.
OnLive coming 'built in' to new VIZIO TVs, Blu-ray players
A month after beginning shipments of its Microconsole hardware, cloud gaming service OnLive is announcing a partnership with VIZIO, whereby the electronics company will offer televisions, Blu-ray players, tablet computers and mobile phones that can connect to OnLive right out of the box. According to the announcement made at CES 2011 today, OnLive will be featured as an application on VIZIO's new VIA Plus line of products, which includes the VIA Tablet and VIA Smart Phone, alongside other preinstalled "VIZIO Internet Apps." OnLive founder and CEO, Steve Perlman calls the partnership "a major milestone," while VIZIO's chief technology officer, Matthew McRae, says the inclusion of the OnLive client on its VIA Plus devices will give users "the freedom to switch games much like you change the channel," and is as integral to these products as software for streaming movies and music. VIZIO wil be demoing its VIA Plus products during CES and we'll have a first look at them soon.
