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HTC picks former AT&T exec Mike Woodward as North American president
HTC has been fighting to get a better relationship with US carriers lately, and it may have just chosen a clever (if roundabout) approach: hire one of their executives. As of today, AT&T's former phone portfolio VP Mike Woodward is now HTC's president of its North American division, reporting directly to worldwide sales head Jason Mackenzie. The new position won't necessarily get him any privileged access, but it certainly gives HTC someone who's well versed in what carriers want out of a device launch. We'll have to wait awhile to see what Woodward's strategy will be; suffice it to say that the company wants more One X-level anticipation and fewer of those bumpy, Inspire 4G-like releases.
Nintendo takes on Disney veteran as senior VP for digital in US, gets serious about this whole internet thing
Nintendo hinted it was improving its notoriously rudimentary online access with word of the Nintendo Network early this year, and was even more adamant at E3 about making a big push into digital video. Some have accused the company of nothing but flag-waving -- if that's true, the waving is about to turn into a full parade through a new hire. As of July 1st, Nintendo is bringing on Disney's former Interactive Media Group senior VP Duncan Orrell-Jones to take on the just-minted role of senior VP for the company's Network Business group in the US. He'll be handling the overall American digital strategy, which covers both gaming as well as content. We'll need to wait awhile before we see the results, but if it helps make sure friend codes never rise from the dead to haunt our Wii U, we're all for it.
Carrier IQ hires former Verizon privacy counsel Magnolia Mobley as Chief Privacy Officer
It's been several months since Carrier IQ explained its data collection practices and responded to FCC and Senatorial inquiry about its privacy policies. Despite the fact that it's no longer in the headlines, Carrier IQ's still intent on improving how it handles consumer info. That's why the firm has hired Magnolia Mobley away from Verizon (who eschewed Carrier IQ's services in favor of its own Remote Diagnostics tool), where she was Big Red's Chief Privacy Counsel. Ms. Mobely will be Carrier IQ's General Counsel and Chief Privacy Officer and she's expected to help the company focus on preserving consumer privacy. You can read up on her credentials further in the PR after the break.
MobileNotifier dev snapped up by Apple to work on iOS framework?
We said that MobileNotifier unobtrusive notifications might be the single best reason to jailbreak your iOS device, and it sounds like Apple may agree -- Redmond Pie reports that lead developer Peter Hajas has been spirited away by the Cupertino computer company to work on iOS itself. Hajas wrote that he was taking a break from MobileNotifier, and some newfangled detective work dug up the rest -- a thinly-veiled reference to Steve Jobs, a tweet mentioning a California "fruit" company, and finally an alleged screenshot of Hajas' entry in Apple's employee database. We're feeling slightly bittersweet about the whole thing, to tell the truth, as while we'd rather not have to smash our iPhone chains, the notion that this is all happening now suggests we won't see greatly improved notifications in iOS 5, come Monday. [Thanks, Jeff]
webOS VP flies the coop, joins Numenta as marketing guru for imminent product launch
You probably don't know who Joe Hayashi is -- well, unless you skimmed his bio immediately above -- but he just departed one company that you might care about, and went to another one. Hayashi was VP of webOS product development at Palm / HP, and now he's become the VP of marketing at Numenta, also known as the place where Palm's founder (and two former CEOs) decided to stay after the Folio tanked. Numenta's kept fairly quiet during its six years of operation, except to describe a concept called "hierarchical temporary memory" which could lead to a form of artificial intelligence based on human learning schemes, but we imagine if it needs a marketing guy, the company's about ready to actually create something. For its part, Numenta agrees -- it's publicly stated that we'll see the technology in some sort of product later this year.
Google hires Java founder James Gosling amid Oracle infringement suit - ah, snap!
And the war wages on... We've been reporting on the showdown between Oracle and Google over Java-related patent infringement since its inception, and now El Goog's throwing a little extra excitement into the fray by hiring Java founder, and former VP of Sun Microsystems, James Gosling. When Oracle acquired Sun last year, Gosling, who refused to take part, wasn't shy about expressing his views, calling Oracle's Larry Ellison "Larry, Prince of Darkness." On a post to his blog, which has since crashed, Gosling was vague about his new duties saying simply, "I don't know what I'll be working on. I expect it'll be a bit of everything, seasoned with a large dose of grumpy curmudgeon." That's just the kind of smack talking this scuffle needed to keep things interesting. Long live James Gosling!
Nokia USA president is out, replaced by Microsoft vet Chris Weber as Elopocalypse continues
Conspiracy theorists unite: Nokia's replaced another prominent executive with a former Microsoft employee. In this case, it's the head of Nokia's entire US division that's being oustered, as 15-year Microsoft sales and marketing veteran Chris Weber replaces Nokia Inc. president Mark Louison effective immediately. Mark will "pursue new career opportunities" while Weber takes the reins, as well as the somewhat unenviable role of rejuvenating Nokia's smartphone brand in the United States. Still, we imagine he'll have plenty of help, as he'll be working very, very closely with his alma mater in the months to come -- and the designs practically sell themselves. PR after the break.
Fan hired to edit video for Star Wars: The Old Republic
Fans often ask developers, "How do you get started in the business?" If you want to know the answer, then maybe you should ask Brandon Miletta. Last night, the Star Wars: The Old Republic podcast TOROcast announced that Miletta was leaving the long-running show to go work for the very company he has been talking about in the show for the last two years: BioWare. Miletta will join the crew working on SWTOR as a video editor. Speaking to TOROcast about special treatment over other podcasts, he said, "I will enjoy not being able to tell you guys anything [...] And I look forward to the day where I can listen to a TOROcast episode pick apart something I worked really hard on." Brandon has been an essential part of both the TOROcast site and SWTOR community. Massively would like to congratulate Brandon on turning his dream into a reality, and we look forward to picking apart his work every chance we get. As TOROcast would say: That's it!
Mark Papermaster returns to chip business courtesy of Cisco, Apple silently watches
We don't blame you if you fail to recognize this good looking fella. Just a quick recap: this is Mark Papermaster, the ex-IBM chip designer who stirred up a storm while transitioning to Apple, only to quietly depart the company 16 months later for reasons that we'll never truly know. Fear not though, folks, as word has it that the boy is back in town: Papermaster is now hanging out with Cisco's Silicon Switching Technology Group as its new vice president. Ironically, our man here will be responsible for making chips that power Cisco's switches, so it'll probably be more or less like his good old days back at IBM. Oh, and without Steve Jobs breathing over his shoulders.
Nokia's ex-MeeGo chief lands at Palm?
It looks like design heads at Palm and Nokia have more or less swapped roles, as All Things D reports that Nokia's ex-MeeGo head Ari Jaaksi has just been hired by Palm -- a month after Nokia grabbed Palm's Peter Skillman to head up user experience and services for MeeGo. Fate? Coincidence? As long as both struggling smartphone companies bring us better devices and improved operating systems as a result, we're not all that concerned. The report also suggests a Samsung VP and several HP executives will be boosting Palm's team as well.
Nokia hires Peter Skillman, former Palm Design VP, as MeeGo user experience chief (update: confirmed)
Now this, this is what we call exciting. Nokia has managed to scoop up Peter Skillman from the wreckage of the HP/Palm merger. One of the many senior VPs to leave Palm upon its assimilation into the HP empire, Peter spent 11 years with his previous employer and was in charge of the design team that produced the deliciously curvaceous Palm Pre. Now at Nokia, he'll be heading up the user experience and services division for MeeGo, which means that if you weren't excited for the platform already, you've now got a very good reason to be. Update: We met with Marko Ahtisaari, Senior Vice President of Design at Nokia, to get comment on this story. His response? "Right, I just hired him." So why not announce it, we asked, this is pretty big news? According to Marko, "We have products today, products are more interesting. Peter is looking after the user experience design of MeeGo and services and is a great new addition to the team." Marko's team, to be specific. To us this seems like another component that could help Nokia break into the US market with MeeGo. [Thanks, Dave]
Apple hires NFC expert to manage mobile commerce, prepare to pay with your iPhone
Don't look now, but things may be getting real on the pay-with-your-cell-phone front, as Cupertino's hired a man with years of experience in enabling just that to finally get 'er done. According to his LinkedIn profile, Benjamin Vigier is Apple's new Product Manager of Mobile Commerce, immediately following his handiwork on PayPal Mobile, Sprint MyMoneyManager and the iPhone-based Starbucks Card. Before that, he spent two years heading SanDisk's mobile commerce and near-field communication efforts and over a year doing NFC for Bouygues Telecom, so it's not much of a stretch to imagine the futuristic concert tickets depicted in Apple's recent patent applications might become reality before long. Either that, or he'll wind up on a completely unrelated project, only to leave under mysterious circumstances later on.
David Reeves retires from SCEE, Andrew House gleefully takes over
The always outspoken and completely outré David Reeves has decided to retire from his post as President, CEO and Co-COO at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE). During his 14 years with the company, Sir Reeves has provided us with loads to talk about, even finding himself the proud owner of our 37th edition of 'CE-Oh No He Didn't!' The scuttlebutt is that Reeves could be leaving to share his talents with Realtime Worlds, but then again, maybe he's just out to step foot in the 40 remaining countries that he has yet to visit. At any rate, Sony has already selected Andrew House (pictured) to take over on May 1st, with a release noting that he will soon be responsible for "managing the PlayStation business across nearly 100 countries in the Europe / PAL territories, including the company's PlayStation2, PSP and PlayStation 3 platforms as well as PlayStation Network." Oh, and Mr. House -- we're fully expecting a 'CE-Oh No He Didn't!' quip from you within the first hundred days. Make it happen.Read - David Reeves outRead - Andrew House in
Netflix hires VP of partner products to focus on streaming devices
It's impossible to say what kind of impact Gregory K. Peters will have on Netflix as a whole, but one thing is for sure: we certainly dig his job description. Recently hired on by Netflix as the vice president of partner products, Mr. Peters will be responsible for "bringing to market a range of devices from leading consumer electronics manufacturers that are capable of instantly streaming movies and TV episodes from Netflix directly to consumers' TVs." The new role was established shortly after Netflix decided to deliver HD streaming to the Xbox 360 (and other boxes in the future), and it's a clear signal that the company understands the importance of digital downloads in a world currently dominated by physical discs. The overriding goal? To enable "all US households to stream Netflix to their TVs." Looks like ole Greg will be putting those degrees in physics and astrophysics to good use, huh? Full release is after the jump.
Lair off-screen trailer looked good at GDC
Stills and screenshots can only do so much to convey how good a game looks. Here's an off-screen video presentation of Lair recorded from GDC, showing off the Factor 5 game in action (or, should we say, motion).You might recognize some of the animation from videos seen elsewhere, but it was nice to catch the newer footage of a dragon wireframe model meticulously rendered with layers of musculature and skin, too.If that's not enough for ya, you can always just listen in to the audio, which features a young lady from Washington asking questions of a developer with the hope of getting hired. Consider this a lesson in networking.[Via GameBrink]
