Seattle-based PopCap Games said today it has acquired social gaming firm ZipZapPlay, based in San Francisco. Financial terms weren’t disclosed, but ZipZapPlay has 17 employees (led by founders Curt Bererton and Mathilde Pignol) and gives PopCap a social-game studio presence in the Bay Area. The studio will report to Jon David, PopCap’s vice president of social games development. PopCap has been moving strongly into social-network games, with Bejeweled Blitz and Zuma Blitz, and says it is the third largest Facebook game developer, after Zynga and Electronic Arts.
Author: Gregory T. Huang
Greg is a veteran journalist who has covered a wide range of science, technology, and business. As former editor in chief, he overaw daily news, features, and events across Xconomy's national network. Before joining Xconomy, he was a features editor at New Scientist magazine, where he edited and wrote articles on physics, technology, and neuroscience. Previously he was senior writer at Technology Review, where he reported on emerging technologies, R&D, and advances in computing, robotics, and applied physics. His writing has also appeared in Wired, Nature, and The Atlantic Monthly’s website. He was named a New York Times professional fellow in 2003.
Greg is the co-author of Guanxi (Simon & Schuster, 2006), about Microsoft in China and the global competition for talent and technology. Before becoming a journalist, he did research at MIT’s Artificial Intelligence Lab. He has published 20 papers in scientific journals and conferences and spoken on innovation at Adobe, Amazon, eBay, Google, HP, Microsoft, Yahoo, and other organizations. He has a Master’s and Ph.D. in electrical engineering and computer science from MIT, and a B.S. in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
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