EA Reorganizes Into Four Labels

Reuters is reporting that the mega-publisher EA will soon be reorganized into four separate labels underneath the company's umbrella. The four groups will be known as EA Games, EA Sports, EA Casual Entertainment, and a label simply called 'The Sims'. All four organizations will be supported by two additional EA groups, which will handle publishing and 'development services'. "The changes, based on the success of a pilot program that placed games based on "The Sims" franchise into their own unit, mean it will require fewer executives to sign off on new games or to approve launching an existing game on a different platform or in a different regions. "We ran an organizational experiment and it was pretty damn successful. The Sims grew aggressively," Frank Gibeau, head of the new EA Games unit said."

Comments

hmm

[User 956]

The four groups will be known as EA Games, EA Sports, EA Casual Entertainment, and a label simply called 'The Sims'.

That's odd. I would have expected the fourth one to be "Madden"

Re:hmm

[secretwhistle]

I would have thought EA Sports would just be named "Roster Update."

Speedy?

[toleraen]

"The changes, based on the success of a pilot program that placed games based on "The Sims" franchise into their own unit, mean it will require fewer executives to sign off on new games or to approve launching an existing game on a different platform or in a different regions.

I guess its the bureaucracy that's been holding them back from releasing madden twice a year then? I'm definitely looking forward to madden 07.5 now!

Re:Speedy?

[sglider]

You aren't kidding. What they don't realize is that what works for Madden and The Sims (releasing an expansion or 'booster' pack every 3 months) doesn't work for PC Multiplayer games like the Battlefield Series.

Battlefield 2 sold well, but they tried to capitalize on that by releasing BF2:Special Forces, and Armored Fury and Euro Forces in quick succession, and were rebuffed by the community.

They then didn't learn from their mistake by releasing Battlefield 2142 a scant year after BF2 came out, and it only surpassed BF2 in hours played the first week. Now, it barely registers on the top ten for Xfire, and doesn't hold a good spot on Gamespy's Server list either.

How is this new?

[Myria]

The changes, based on the success of a pilot program that placed games based on "The Sims" franchise into their own unit

Wasn't that "pilot program" called Maxis?

The Sims label

[Bongo Bill]

Would that just be, um, Maxis?

They offered me the chance to run EA Casual...

[DrunkenTerror]

...but I just kinda said, "Fuck it," ya know?

Mislabelled

[GFree]

The four groups will be known as EA Games, EA Sports, EA Casual Entertainment, and a label simply called 'The Sims'.

Those groups don't representative EA well enough I think. They probably should be renamed as:

The four groups will be known as EA Shit, EA Bullshit, EA Thisissoshit, and a label simply called 'The Sims'.

does this really change anything?

[joystickgenie]

Other then in internal upper management command chains does this really change anything? EA has pretty much already had these separations in place with few exceptions.

EA Games: EA Redwood Shores and EA LA
EA Sports: EA Canada, EA Tiburon, EA Chicago and EA UK
EA Casual Entertainment: Pogo and EA Mobil
The Sims: Maxis

Really what is the difference between what is going no now and what has been going on for years?

Bullshit management

[Bombula]

This kind of nonsense from corporations is very revealing. In massive conglomerates, one corporation (i.e.: PepsiCo) may own a subsidiary unit quite different from its original flagship enterprise (i.e.: Taco Bell vs Pepsi). In these situations of acquisition, the challenge is to line up the hierarchy of management with the hierarchy of ownership. It's a challenge, but effective organizations usually manage to get the entire show running as a single, albeit complex and multifaceted, business.

To take an existing company and split it up into smaller sections - whether spin-offs, labels, or whatever - is basically a bullshit move from the standpoint of management. If it's branding we're talking about, that's one thing. Differentiating among brands to target different markets is fine. But to actually split an organization up into separate operating units and decentralize their organizational structure is the new-age crap of the late 80s and 90s that ended up being a giant fart in the spacesuit of business.

Properly managed, a single organization can be of any size and any complexity. Good management will implement organizational decentralization as necessary, and as a corollary will also integrate management of operating units at appropriate decision-making levels to ensure optimum efficiency (management-speak would insert the bullshit word 'synergies' here).

Long story short, if EA was being managed properly in the first place, it wouldn't need to be split apart. The fact that its operating units can't be creative unless they pretend they're separate companies is a sign that the management has no idea what it's doing.

Splitup by exec qualifications

[Animats]

This is really a split based on the needed qualifications of the divisional executives:

• "Games" division - needs an actual game producer in charge. Most R&D in this unit.
• "Sports" division - needs a jock, who hires other jocks, to make games jocks like. Ongoing updates and upgrades, but not much innovation needed. Technology comes from games division and outside suppliers.
• "Casual" division - needs a sales type good at sucking up to cell phone companies. For mobile games, the market is the cell phone company, not the end user.
• "Sims" division - whoever was running that project at Maxis.

Hows about...

[goodenoughnickname]

EA Pestilence, EA War, EA Famine, and EA Death