Activision Blizzardchief operating officer and president Daniel Alegre is set to leave the company for a blockchain startup in early 2023, the executive revealed. The news of this departure arrives less than three years afterActivision Blizzard hired Alegreto replace its previous COO Coddy Johnson.
Before joining Activision Blizzard in April 2020, Alegre spent 16 years at Google, where he worked in a variety of roles, culminating in a 30-month stint as president of global retail, shopping, and payments. During his time with the Alphabet-owned company, the industry veteran oversaw Google’s expansions in Latin America and Asia Pacific. He was also part of the management team that spearheaded the technology giant’s initial move into mobile operating systems, which started with the 2008 introduction of Android. According to its SEC filings,Activision Blizzard spent over ten million dollarsjust to pull Alegre away from Google.
RELATED:EU Contradicts FTC Claim About Microsoft Activision Blizzard Acquisition
Alegre is now set to join blockchain startup Yuga Labs as its new chief executive officer in the first half of 2023. The company’s current CEO, Nicole Muniz, will continue serving in an advisory role once Alegre takes the helm. Yuga Labs is best known as the creator of Bored Ape Yacht Club, a non-fungible token (NFT) collection powered by the Ethereum blockchain. The company was the subject of some controversy in April 2022 aftera large-scale Bored Ape Yacht Club hackleft its users with losses amounting to millions of dollars.
While fairly short, Alegre’s stint at Activision Blizzard was far from uneventful. Most notably, the outgoing COO oversaw a major leadership change at the company prompted by a gender discrimination and sexual harassment lawsuit that the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing filed against the conglomerate in the summer of 2021. Back then, it was Alegre who announced thatthen-Blizzard President J. Allen Brack is stepping downin the immediate aftermath of the scandal.
Alegre will stay withActivision Blizzarduntil the end of his current term as COO, which is scheduled to conclude on May 25, 2025. The Santa Monica, California-based company hasn’t yet named his replacement, presumably because the search for its new COO is still ongoing.
Activision Blizzard is still in the process of trying to win regulatory approval for its proposed merger with Microsoft. The technology giant agreed to a $68.7 billion all-cash takeover of Activision Blizzard in January 2022, but the deal has hit some regulatory roadblocks in recent months, with everyone from the FTC to the European Commission now probing the acquisition on antitrust grounds.
MORE:Microsoft’s 10-Year Commitment to Bring Call of Duty to Nintendo is Nothing More Than Legal Fodder
