Hans ten Cate has joined Method Studios as VP, sr. business development, games. The former Sony PlayStation manager and Electronic Arts studio executive and producer will focus on bringing Method Studios’ award-winning creative talent and deep technology resources to game developers and publishers to produce cinematics, trailers and teasers, marketing and social content.
“Video games have become more film-like in recent years,” ten Cate said, “with tremendous attention paid to realism and details in character models, animations, cinematics, and effects. Concurrently, the film industry has started using game engines as essential tools in the production process. Method is right at the crux of both of these worlds, with expertise and technology in both, and creative work that has earned Oscar and Emmy recognition. They can also create, direct, produce and deliver every aspect of a project. I’m incredibly excited to bring this very special combination of capabilities to partners in the games industry.”
A long-time game industry executive, ten Cate has produced and designed AAA games for PC, console and mobile and negotiated business and technology partnerships for the industry’s largest publishers as well as startups. He spent a decade at EA, as an executive producer creating award-winning games and later as sr. director of business development for EA Partners. Ten Cate contributed to such game franchises as The Sims, The Simpsons, and Dante’s Inferno. At EA Partners, he built relationships with hundreds of game development studios and partners. Ten Cate later co-founded MaxPlay, a games technology company, where he was VP of business development and was instrumental in building and growing the company’s partnerships and developer relations organization. He is an executive board member of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) and is based in San Francisco.
“Hans has been on both the business and creative sides of the games industry,” said Andrew Bell, Method Studios MD, integrated advertising and immersive experiences, Los Angeles. “He’s done everything from leading creative teams to negotiating partnerships at the highest level. He brings deep knowledge and relationships that really complement our team and open new doors for our talent.”
Method Studios’ games trailer work includes standout pieces for Fallout 76, Evony, Game of War and other top titles. The company completed visual effects work on recent features including Aquaman, Fantastic Beasts: the Crimes of Grindelwald, Christmas Chronicles and Welcome to Marwen.
Method Studios, a Deluxe company, maintains a network of facilities in Los Angeles, Vancouver, New York, Montreal, San Francisco, Atlanta, Melbourne, and Pune, India.
Google Opens Its Defense In Antitrust Case Alleging Monopoly Over Online Ad Technology
Google opened its defense against allegations that it holds an illegal monopoly on online advertising technology Friday with witness testimony saying the industry is vastly more complex and competitive than portrayed by the federal government.
"The industry has been exceptionally fluid over the last 18 years," said Scott Sheffer, a vice president for global partnerships at Google, the company's first witness at its antitrust trial in federal court in Alexandria.
The Justice Department and a coalition of states contend that Google built and maintained an illegal monopoly over the technology that facilitates the buying and selling of online ads seen by consumers.
Google counters that the government's case improperly focuses on a narrow type of online ads — essentially the rectangular ones that appear on the top and on the right-hand side of a webpage. In its opening statement, Google's lawyers said the Supreme Court has warned judges against taking action when dealing with rapidly emerging technology like what Sheffer described because of the risk of error or unintended consequences.
Google says defining the market so narrowly ignores the competition it faces from social media companies, Amazon, streaming TV providers and others who offer advertisers the means to reach online consumers.
Justice Department lawyers called witnesses to testify for two weeks before resting their case Friday afternoon, detailing the ways that automated ad exchanges conduct auctions in a matter of milliseconds to determine which ads are placed in front of which consumers and how much they cost.
The department contends the auctions are finessed in subtle ways that benefit Google to the exclusion of would-be competitors and in ways that prevent... Read More