Two more execs jump ship at Zynga

Wed 05 Dec 2012 8:39am GMT / 3:39am EST / 12:39am PST
Publishing Social

Roy Seghal and Steve Schreck walk from struggling social company

Zynga

Another two Zynga executives have joined the long list of high-profile departures to hit the struggling social game company this year.

According to a report on Bloomberg, Roy Seghal, vice president of Zynga's casual and arcade games division and the creator of Cafe World, has resigned to take some time away from work.

The other departure is Steve Schreck, general manager of around 100 employees in the company's zCasual division. He was directly responsible for Hidden Chronicles and led the design of Slingo, the company's entry into the arcade genre. Schreck will join former Zynga CCO Mike Verdu at his new mobile games start-up.

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14 Comments

Bruce Everiss

Zynga "struggling" is a bit of an exaggeration.

Look at what the Wall Street Journal headlines are:
Zynga to Bundle Games With Cable TV
US HOT STOCKS: Oshkosh, Vail Resorts, Young Innovations, Zynga ...
Zynga's Changing Facebook Relationship May Not Be Such a Bad ...
US HOT STOCKS: VeriSign, Zynga, Supervalu, Groupon

And:
ABOUT ZYNGA
Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ: ZNGA) is the world's leading provider of social game services with more than 240 million monthly active users playing its games, which include CityVille, Zynga Poker, Draw Something, Hidden Chronicles, FarmVille, CastleVille, Words With Friends, Empires & Allies, Scramble With Friends, Café World, The Pioneer Trail, Indiana Jones™ Adventure World and Mafia Wars. Zynga's games are available on a number of global platforms, including Facebook, Zynga.com, Google+, Tencent, Apple iOS and Google Android. Through Zynga.org, Zynga players have raised more than $10 million for world social causes.

Posted:6 months ago

Dave Herod
Senior Programmer

Codemasters

Top Comment Well then, I guess Mark Pincus must have been crying tears of happiness the other day about everyone leaving.

Posted:6 months ago

Peter Dwyer
Games Designer/Developer

"Schreck will join former Zynga CCO Mike Verdu at his new mobile games start-up."

Not going to say a word...

Posted:6 months ago

Bruce Everiss

Exactly the same thing happened at Microsoft when they went public. Over 10,000 people became millionaires. Some left to set up their own companies. Gabe Newell, for instance. He produced the first three versions of windows. Did people then say that Microsoft was struggling? And he wasn't the only one.
Chris Peters left. Stephanie DeVaan left. Rich Tong left. Raghav Kher left. John Sage left. Ric Weiland left. Charkes Simonyi left. Richard Brodie left. Rob Glaser left. Rob Greenberg left. Gordon Letwin left. Rob Wallace left. Nathan Myhrvold left. And many more. Mostly to set up their own businesses.

Posted:6 months ago

Sandy Lobban
Managing Director

Noise Me Up

Whether people are coming or going, all you need to ask yourself is "would I buy shares in this company"? My answer would be no currently. If its yes, then you'd better hurry up whilst its at a great price. :)

Posted:6 months ago

Jim Webb
Executive Editor/Community Director

E-mpire Ltd. Co.

Bruce, it really depends on what aspect of the company you assign the "struggling" to.

Struggling to retain executive leadership? Absolutely.

Posted:6 months ago

Bruce Everiss

@Jim Webb
Microsoft lost Paul Allen, their co-founder.

Posted:6 months ago

Jim Webb
Executive Editor/Community Director

E-mpire Ltd. Co.

Top Comment Geez, Bruce. Allen largely left MS back in 1982 went he got cancer. He officially resigned from the board of directors in 2000. When did Microsoft have their IPO? 1986. How the hell does that relate at all?

How about we really stop comparing Zynga to Microsoft for a moment.

Edited 1 times. Last edit by Jim Webb on 5th December 2012 3:20pm

Posted:6 months ago

Martin Klima
Executive Producer

Warhorse Studios

A year after IPO, Microsoft share price was approximately four times higher. Zynga price is about four times lower. That does seem like "struggling" to me. Other WSJ headlines:
* After a 46% Drop, an Opportunity
* End of the Affair for Zynga and Facebook?
* Deal Journal's Winners & Losers: Zynga's Bad Week
* Zynga Slides After Changing the Rules of Its Relationship With Facebook
...etc.

Posted:6 months ago

Davidicus Schacher
Art Director

Music Mastermind Inc.

anyone have a tally of the total number of execs who have jumped ship? i've completely lost track now...

Posted:6 months ago

#10

Russell Carroll
Game Director

A2Z Development Center

Is there a comparison on earnings of Zynga vs. Microsoft?
I've got to think MS hit earnings sooner, but that may be totally offbase.
For Zynga, my questions continue to be:
- When will they start making money again?
- How much money will they make?
Both of those questions have bad answers in my analysis of their situation.

Posted:6 months ago

#11

Hugo Trepanier
Senior UI Designer

Hibernum

Who is replacing all these people? Is Zynga simply losing their execs in succession or are they also hiring new ones (and if so how come we never hear about this bit in the news)?

Also, a lot of these execs probably arrived at Zynga through various acquisitions and it is not uncommon for these people to leave after they have received all their bonuses and other compensations. I've seen this happen enough times in my short 14 years career to consider it the norm. That said, things still look dour at the big Z with all the bad news of the past few months.

Posted:6 months ago

#12

Dave Herod
Senior Programmer

Codemasters

Who is replacing all these people?

I was wondering that myself. I'm still waiting for one exec leaving to say "I've greatly enjoyed my time as Vice President of <whatever>. After all, last week I was the janitor."

Posted:6 months ago

#13