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Take-Two expands into Hamilton Landing
MARIN UNIT PART OF BOOM SEEN BY COUNTY'S GAME INDUSTRY
Monday, May 1, 2006
BY LORALEE STEVENS
STAFF REPORTER
NOVATO - The Visual Concepts Entertainment division of Take-Two Interactive Software Inc. is leaving its quarters on Thorndale Drive and expanding into an entire hangar at Hamilton Landing.
The video game studio expects to move its 150 employees into the 55,000 square foot space in early January.
"It's the biggest deal yet for Hamilton Landing," said Brian Eisberg of Orion Partners, who with his partner Haden Ongaro represented Barker Pacific, Hamilton Landing's management firm.
Though Mr. Eisberg did not name the tenant due to a confidentiality agreement, Take-Two representatives confirmed a lease had been signed.
The move follows New York-based Take-Two's purchase of Visual Concepts from Sega Corporation of Japan. Take-Two paid approximately $24 million for the Marin County developer of the popular 2K sports games.
Extensive work will be necessary to outfit Hangar Eight with sound labs, software stations and space for graphics artists, according to Anthony Chau, public relations manager of Visual Concepts.
"We're definitely in growth mode. The whole gaming industry is growing," said Mr. Chau.
The amount allocated for outfitting Hangar Eight was not disclosed, but the general contractor will be Barker Pacific, with Devcon of Milpitas building out the shell and core, according to Mr. Eisberg.
Peter Kuran, animation supervisor for Industrial Light and Magic on George Lucas' "The Empire Strikes Back," founded visual Concepts in 1982.
The independent studio worked on early versions of Electronic Arts' "Madden NFL" and Sega's "Floigan Bros." games.
Following its success with Sega's Sports 2K franchise, Sega acquired the studio and restructured it to become the major development and production branch for the ESPN video game franchise.
But in 2004, Electronic Arts obtained exclusive NFL and ESPN licenses, and Sega exited sports publishing, selling Visual Concepts to its current owner in 2005.
Take-Two, a global company with more than 1,000 employees, publishes the "Grand Theft Auto" series and "The Warriors." With the acquisition of Visual Concepts, it gets sports series featuring the NBA, NHL, college basketball and major league baseball, among other sports.
Sega has agreed to publish and distribute the 2K sports series in Japan, and also bring sports games developed by Visual Concepts to its arcade business.
The division is hiring, seeking at least a dozen software engineers, animators and artists.
Game business flourishes in Marin
Another Marin game designer, Level 5 in San Rafael, is growing as well. The developer of titles such as "Star Wars," "Rogue Squadron" and "BallBlazer Champions" is looking for about 25 engineers and artists.
Telltale Games in San Rafael is a startup that produces games based on popular authors and comic books. Telltale has 22 employees and has just closed a second round of funding, according to Telltale Chief Financial Officer Andre Blanadet.
TimeLapse Mobile, a smaller startup in Novato, is getting close to launching its first video cell phone game, according to co-founder Michael Nelson.
"There are lots of small game designers here in Marin, but it's not an easy industry to break into. Take-Two is a relatively new game developer, and very successful. Visual Concepts was very fortunate to be picked up by them," he said.
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