ACGI Advisory board

Alisa Chumachenko
Founder & President, Game Insight LLC

Alisa Chumachenko is one of the most respected specialists in marketing, promotion and advertising of online games, casual games and games for social networks in Russia, Eastern and Central Europe.

In 2004 Alisa has joined a young but ambitious company called IT Territory, which developed and launched the game "Territory". This game set a new quality standard for browser-based MMORPG at that time. Moreover, IT Territory launched a range of other browser-based games, each of which showed the highest results. In 2006 IT Territory launched a superproject «Legend: Legacy of the Dragons". Alisa played a key role in the promotion of this game, which then became the biggest event on the browser-based MMORPG market, reaching an unprecedented commercial success and winning the hearts of many millions of players both in Russia and abroad.

In 2007 Alisa Chumachenko took up a position of the Vice-President for Marketing and Advertising in a holding company Astrum Online Entertainment. AOE includes such companies as Astrum Nival, IT Territory, Time Zero, Nikita Online and Dark Joker Games. AOE is a recognized market leader, which runs tens of browser-based and client MMOG and casual games. Alisa Chumachenko formes the best professional marketing team in Russia, the results of which are a steady growth of financial indicators of Astrum Online, a dozens of launched projects, marketing, advertising and PR successful support of projects of the holding company. Among them are such games as Allods Online Legend: Legacy of the Dragons, Perfect World, The Lord of the Rings Online, Last Chaos, Silkroad Online, Three Kingdoms, Heroes: Rebirth, ParaPa: City Dance, Piratia, Granado Espada and many others.

In December 2009 the holding company Astrum Online Entertainment affiliated the Internet company Mail.Ru. Alisa Chumachenko decided to set up her own business and left the position of the Vice-President of AOE for Marketing and Advertising. She founded a company called Game Insight and became its President. Nowadays Game Insight is a key player on the market of developing and publishing games for social networks. There are more than a dozen projects of Game Insight running in the world's largest social networks such as Vkontakte, Facebook, Hi5, MySpace, Friendster, Odnoklassniki and others. The user number of Game Insight's games exceeded twenty millionth mark and continues to grow steadily. More recently Game Insight has announced the launch of another great project - club of the players called Funzay.com. Announcement has become one of the main events at the Conference Sociality Rocks in October 2010 in Kiev! Once again this event has demonstrated the highest level of Alisa Chumachenko as the trend setter and a specialist in marketing and promotion of online games.

Alexey Kostarev
Co-Founder and General Producer, i-Jet Media

Alexey Kostarev is Co-Founder and General Producer of i-Jet Media which is an international social games distribution network.

In 2001, he graduated from the Electrotechnical Department of the Urals State Technical Unversity and founded an internet provider, Medialt. The business virtually started in an apartment for lack of money to rent an office. However, Medialt succeeded to become the most profitable internet provider in the city of Ekaterinburg just after four years.

In 2005, Alexey Kostarev and his partners decided to sell Medialt and focus on games. Thus, in 2005, i-Jet Media was founded.

In 2007, i-Jet Media published its first game projects on Rambler.ru, and the first cult social game Mafia New was launched. Following its success, Alexey Kostarev decided to focus on games for social networks and left for the USA to study the social games market.

In April 2009, i-Jet Media launched Happy Farmer which exploded the Russian Internet: the game succeeded to collect about 10 million unique active users, and earned USD $20 million during less than one year. This record of the 'Runet' is still unbroken. Happy Farmer was also honoured with the Google Trend prize as the best game of 2009.
i-Jet Media today is the largest social games publisher and distributor in Russia and Eastern Europe, and a leader in a segment of 'games with friends'. To date, 60 million users of 30 social networks all over the world play 70 applications published by i-Jet Media. There are all top social game brands in the portfolio of i-Jet Media. Nowadays, i-Jet Media is developing European and Asian markets, and mobile social games services.
Investors estimate the current market capitalization of i-Jet Media at USD $100 million.
Offices of i-Jet Media are situated in Silicon Valley (CA, USA) and Beijing (China) as well as Ekaterinburg, Chelyabinsk, Nizhny Tagil and Ozersk (Russia).

Andrey Fadeev
Progrestar Inc., CEO and founder.

Progrestar is a leading social application full-cycle developer, setting the standard of quality and dynamics for the whole industry. This leadership position has been established and attained over the last two years in the extremely competitive environment.

Owing to this invaluable asset Progrestar released almost 15 projects, highly appreciated by users of the most popular social networks - vkontakte.ru, mymail.ru, odnoklassniki.ru, facebook.com. Progrestar projects have over 20,000,000 registered users from over 100 countries around the globe. Subscriptions are growing by 2000,000 monthly
Every single project release creates a tsunami across the social networks, taking top positions in the ratings in the first weeks following the release. Having accumulated a vast database, the company is capable to create new products appealing to specific habits and desires of various segments of the audience. The company employs over
50 highly professional developers in its offices in Moscow.

In 2010 Progrestar've launched the game 'Digger' in three main Russian social networks (vKontakte.ru, Odnoklassniki.ru and MoiMir@Mail.ru) having a million users in the first two weeks. Recently the company
decided to launch this multilanguage game within Facebook, aiming at the global market. Progrestar was the first Russian developer to implement Facebook credits as a payment system and became the fastest growing Russian developer on Facebook. 8th place in Top Gainers Games.

Avni Yerli
Managing Director, Crytek GmbH

After completing a degree in mechanical engineering in 1994, Avni Yerli started his business career as a project manager at a leading Bavarian planning and consulting company. Three years later, he became a Managing Director of a subsidiary of a foreign consulting company and, by early 1998, he was running his own business as an independent consulter. But, being an ardent gamer, it wasn’t long before Avni joined his brothers Cevat and Faruk in founding the interactive entertainment development company Crytek in November 1999. As founding member and Managing Director, Avni is responsible for business development and strategic development. He currently holds advisory board positions with GDC Europe and ACGI (All-Russian Conference on Game Industry).

Dmitry Arkhipov
VP Development and Owner, Akella
Dmitriy is one of the co-founders of Akella. Akella company - is a flagman of Russian game industry.

Company was established in 1993 and became one of the leaders of domestic game industry for 17 years of successful progress. Akella brand is widely known in Russia and abroad. The company’s products are on sale successfully more than in 86 countries worldwide, on all continents and are translated on all main languages. Akella is one of the first companies in Russian history that started to release the products that have obtained wide international recognition. The game “Pirates of the Caribbean” was sold by more than 2 000 copies (twice platinum disc) and took high opinions from professionals all over the world. Besides Akella was the first company in Russia that received licenses for games development for Microsoft Xbox 360® and Sony Playstation®. Akella became the first Russian company that started to develop games on world brands.

Today Akella has about 250 high-qualified specialists. Following publishing activity Akella collaborates with 25 development studios in Russia and abroad. During the long period of successful work Akella being publisher released more than 1 000 game and multimedia products and more than 150 products as developer.

Frank Holz
Managing Director, IEM Consulting

Frank has studied economics with a focus on international marketing. He started his career as a marketing consultant working for high class companies such as Daimler Benz, Mercedes Benz and Vodafone. He entered the games industry in 1996. He was Marketing Director at Infogrames and Atari. Later he became International Marketing & Sales Director at 10tacle studios. Beginning of 2008 he founded IEM Consulting, an international consultancy
specialised in the games industry. IEM Consulting is supporting game developers with international business development and financial funding.

Frank Sliwka
Vice President European Business Development, UBM TechWeb

Frank Sliwka started his business career in 1992 at Messe Berlin (Germany), one of the most important convention and conference center worldwide. So he was i. e. responsible for the international business development and acquisition for the "IFA - Consumer electronics Show" and for "HomeTech - International exhibition for household appliances" and he handled with budget over 10 millions.
Frank Sliwka entered the games industry in 1997. With his company Global Games Media, he worked successfully with Leipziger Messe for GC - Games Convention, GC Developers Conference (GCDC) and GC Asia (Singapore) until fall 2008. During this time, he established GCDC as one of the main game developer conferences worldwide, and GC Asia as one of the main game industry events in Asia.
In December 2008, Think Services (now UBM TechWeb) acquired Sliwka's company, Global Games Media Ltd., and from that time onwards, Frank Sliwka has served as UBM TechWeb' Vice President of European Business Development and Event Director for GDC Europe. He needed only two years to establish GDC Europe as the leading game industry conference in Europe and one of the most important game industry conferences in the world. Also he works as consultant for Koelnmesse to establish gamescom, Europe?s most important game industry exhibition.
Sliwka has deep experience and knowledge in the conference and exhibition business as well as in the games industry and has a worldwide network of contacts. He is very well known as a talented business development strategist and game industry expert around the globe.
Frank Sliwka is member of the board of GDC Europe, gamescom and ACGI (All-Russian Conference on Game Industry). Also he is a member of the jury of European Innovative Games Award (EIGA).

Gagan Ahluwalia
CEO, GlobalStep
Gagan Ahluwalia is the founder and CEO of GlobalStep LLC, one of the fastest growing game testing companies in the world with offices in Dallas, Los Angeles, Amsterdam and Pune, India. As the CEO of GlobalStep, Gagan works with clients and colleagues in Europe, America and Asia on a day to day basis and has an excellent understanding of the cross cultural complexity of a global supply chain and the latest production trends in the games industry.

Prior to founding GlobalStep, Gagan was a partner in the consulting firm of PricewaterhouseCoopers.

He received his MBA in strategy from the University of Washington in Seattle and his executive education includes training with both General Motors and Ford Motor Company.

Ian Kelso
President & CEO, Interactive Ontario (io)

Ian is the President & CEO and a founder of Interactive Ontario (io), a member-based industry trade association representing over 250 interactive digital media companies working in interactive media in such areas as video game development, mobile innovation and online content creation in the province of Ontario. At io, Ian is responsible for both operations and long-term strategy and has overseen a manifold growth of the organization in the past four years. While at io, Ian founded and is Executive Producer of GameON: Finance, a financial forum for the video game industry, IN: the Interactive Exchange, Canada’s largest annual cross-platform event dedicated to the business of interactive media, and the upcoming international conference INplay on kids and interactivity which will took place for the first time in Toronto in May 2010.

In 2007 Ian became President and Chair of the Canadian Interactive Alliance / L’alliance interactive canadienne (CIAIC), the united voice of Canada’s Interactive Media trade associations representing over 1000 companies from coast to coast. He is also a founding Director of the organization and their Project Leader for their flagship study the Canadian Interactive Industry Profile (CIIP).

Throughout the past 17 years Ian has worked as both an executive and creative producer with a number of Interactive and television production companies including Primitive Entertainment, MediaLinx Interactive LLP / Sympatico (Bell Canada), and TotalNet Inc. He began his career in interactive in 1994 as Director of Media Services at Magic Online, one of Canada's first commercial online and Internet access and social networking services.

As a strong advocate for the Interactive Media industry both provincially and nationally, Ian is a member of the Board of Directors of the Cultural Human Resources Council, the Mobile Experience Innovation Centre and the Cultural Careers Council of Ontario, as well as the Co-Chair of the Ontario Media Development Corporation Interactive Digital Media Advisory Committee.

Ian is a regular speaker at national and international industry events including Game Developers Conference (San Francisco), GameFocus Germany (Hanover), European Games Summit (Brussels), the Toronto International Film Festival (Toronto), Banff Television Festival (Banff), Ontario Bar Association Entertainment, Media and Communications Conference (Toronto), Prime Time (Ottawa), FaxExpo Canada (Toronto) and the Entertainment Industries Summit (Toronto). He is also on the Advisory Board of the All-Russian Games Conference.

Ian has a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) from York University where he completed an individualized study programme with concentrations in film, screenwriting, photography and creative writing. He is also the Founding President of the Creative Arts Students’ Association (CASA), the official student government for the Faculty of Fine Arts at York.

Ian lives in midtown Toronto with his wife and two daughters.

Konstantin Popov
CEO, Biart Studio
Konstantin Popov entered the games industry in 2002 when he founded his first game company that was successfully sold in 2006 in Russia. In 2007 he established Biart Studio. Development of commercially successful high-technology games and educational software including “serious games” for PC, Microsoft Xbox 360®, Sony Playstation® 3, Sony Playstation® Portable became the main goal of the company. For these purposes Biart Studio under management of Konstantin started the development of its own multiplatform engine called biEngine. First games based on biEngine will be released in 2011 year.

Now Biart Studio actively works on joint educational projects with Ministry of the Russian Federation for Civil Defense, Emergences and Elimination of Consequences of Natural Disasters (EMERCOM of Russia).

From 2008 Konstantin Popov works in GR direction and during last years has formed close relationships with different Russian state authorities and ministries. From the year 2009 Konstantin Popov is a co-founder of political non-profit partnership “National Innovative System”.

In October 2009 Biart Studio jointly with Russian government and State Academy of Innovations organized and carried out the All-Russian Conference on Game Industry (ACGI) on the territory of the special economic zone. The Conference became the first international game industry event in Russia.

There it was taken a decision to establish Russian Association of Developers and Publishers of Game Industry and Interactive Technologies (RADIT). Association is aimed to develop game industry in Russia, collaborate with international market.

From the year 2010 Konstantin Popov is a co-founder and President of RADIT.

Dr Malte Behrmann
General Secretary, European Game Developer Federation (EGDF)

Malte Behrmann is an attorney based in Berlin. After law studies in Bonn and Munich, he pursued Audiovisual Communication Management at Valenciennes, France. Malte has led legal & development affairs at Pix.Co, a Korean animation studio, and currently teaches international co-production and film funding law in Valenciennes. Besides his legal and university work, Malte lectures at Games Academy in Berlin and in different institutions in France.

Malte co-founded the German National Association of Game Developers (GAME e.V.) and serves today as the organisation's managing director - politics. As general secretary of the European Game Developer Federation (EGDF), he also works actively on game development issues at the European level.

Malte is also author of two books on media policy.

Sergey Orlovskiy
President, Nival Group

Sergey Orlovskiy is the President of Nival Group and one founding fathers of Russian video games industry. He managed the production of more than 15 internationally recognized games and franchises, including Blitzkrieg, Silent Storm, Heroes of Might and Magic V and Allods Online. Sergey was a founder of Astrum Nival (aka Nival Online) which was recently acquired by Mail.ru. Now he is the President at Nival Network, a leading Russian online gaming and social media company.

Vsevolod Leonov
Vice President of International Business Development, Mail.Ru

Vsevolod Leonov has been working in the online industry for more than 10 years. In 1999 he received a master's degree in Economics from the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia. In 2006-2008 he worked for Microsoft Russia focusing his main efforts on business development and marketing of online services, including MSN and Windows Live. In 2008 Vsevolod joined Astrum Online Entertainment, the largest Russian developer and publisher of online games, working as VP of Global Business Development.
Since 2009, when Astrum Online Entertainment merged with Mail.Ru, the foremost Russian Internet portal, Vsevolod became the VP of International Business Development at Mail.Ru. With his vast experience in the sector of online services and a profound knowledge of the Russian game industry, distribution, licensing, and online advertising Vsevolod plays a very important role in building and strengthening the company’s global presence and bringing wonderful game titles to people all over the world.

Zhihai Han
President of Howell International Trade Fair Ltd.
Deputy Secretary-General of Game Publication Committee of the Publishers Association of China
Secretary-General of ChinaJoy Organizing Committee

Mr. Zhihai Han, senior professional in China’s exhibition industry, has been engaging himself in the event planning, management and operating of massive-scale international exhibitions, conferences and relevant events for over 20 years. Mr. Han enjoys a good industrial fame by successfully leading his team both to plan and to operate a great many events that have a good brand influence worldwide. The above-mentioned events involves with a variety of industries, among which are machinery manufacturing, IT, fast consuming goods, printing & duplicating as well as digital entertainment.

In 2002, with Mr. Han taking the lead, Howell International Trade Fair Ltd. created China Digital Entertainment Expo & Conference and its brand called ChinaJoy. Mr. Han has also been serving as the Secretary-General of the organizing committee of ChinaJoy ever since. Over the past eight years, by leading his team, Mr. Han has planned and organized a good number of international events related with the gaming and animation industry such as China Game Business Conference (CGBC), China Game Developers Conference (CGDC), China Game Outsourcing Conference (CGOC), China Cosplay Carnival, The Golden Plume Annual Game Award and China Game Develoeprs Award (CGDA).