Activation Blizzard has announced that Daniel Alegre, Google’s president of global retail and shopping, will be named as their new president and COO. The former Google exec will take over primary operations duties as Activision-Blizzard works to develop more content for their current and future slate of titles. Alegre will replace Cody Johnson beginning April 7. The latter of the two executives will stay within the company in an advisory role.
Activision Blizzard’s brand has developed a lot these last few years. The announcements surrounding both Diablo 4 and Overwatch 2 have drummed up a ton of hype, with fans of these games being very excited. It will be the new COO’s job to shepherd the company during these launches and beyond. The responsibilities taken on by Alegre will include all games currently under the banner of the main sections of the company. So that means he and his subordinates will coordinate on games like Candy Crush and Call of Duty, as well Blizzard-specific games like World of Warcraft and Overwatch. And of course, he will also act in a leading role on upcoming games too. He seems excited about the prospect too.
Alegre wrote in a statement about the future of his prospects with the gaming company:
Activision Blizzard is at an exciting point in its history. In addition to a deep library of owned and internationally beloved franchises, the company has tremendous talent that has built a culture committed to inspiration and creativity. More importantly, through thoughtful and creative games, it connects and engages over 400 million people around the world through epic entertainment. I look forward to helping players around the world connect through quality and immersive games.
Daniel Alegre has been with Google for around 16 years in various positions. For comparison, Johnson holds about 13 years of experience within the Activision-Blizzard family. The wealth of knowledge that Alegre brings about consumer-facing product design and deployment could be a huge help for the company.
Things have not all be roses and rainbows for the AAA gaming giant though, as major controversies have stained their reputation. The mass lay-offs in 2019 didn’t help one bit, as angry gamers learned that hundreds of employees were let go amid a booming year of revenue. Then when Blizzard banned Blitzchung, a Hearthstone pro, over political comments surrounding China, gamers were even angrier.
