Redwood City-based video game publisher Electronic Arts Inc. is taking a direct shot at Irvine-based Blizzard Entertainment Inc. with its own “massively multiplayer online” game, set to be released next year.
Electronic Arts is mining a cult classic to develop “Star Wars: The Old Republic” as a game that would draw millions of players to face off over the Internet.
It teamed up with LucasFilm Ltd., the production company run by Star Wars creator George Lucas, to collaborate on game design and marketing.
Players can choose avatars that are Jedi, Sith or a variety of other classic “Star Wars” characters.
Blizzard, no stranger to epic battles within its own “World of Warcraft” PC game franchise, doesn’t seem fazed.
“Every massive multiplayer game is one we talk about and one we end up playing ourselves,” said Tom Chilton, game director for “World of Warcraft,” which has some 12 million players and counting.
Blizzard—which often touts its perfectionism and extreme fealty to its fans among its strongest assets—hopes the game “is a good one,” Chilton said.
“I hope it’s a good game, for the sake of the industry in general,” he said. “Historically, Electronic Arts hasn’t made a lot of massive multiplayer games that have really been competitive, but that could always change.”
Linc Fetches $300 Million
Irvine’s Linc Group LLC, which runs a mix of building management companies, was acquired by New York-based ABM Industries Inc. for $300 million in cash.
Linc Group has a nationwide network of subsidiaries that help building operators cut costs by reducing power consumption and running more efficiently.
Linc saw $579 million in 2009 sales, the company said.
Chief Executive Tracy Price is set to continue running the unit as president of ABM’s engineering group in Irvine.
Price founded Irvine-based FieldCentrix Inc., which developed software and computer systems for field-service technicians based on plans he initially sketched out on a napkin. He ended up with Houston-based Enron Corp. after selling FieldCentrix to the energy trading company in 2001.
Enron started unraveling soon after the acquisition. Price spent two years extracting the business from Enron. He found a white knight in GI Partners of Menlo Park, a private equity firm which led a buyout of the business in 2003.
Price then returned to Irvine and founded Linc Group, which specializes in “bundled energy solutions” that involve retrofitting buildings to save energy and cut costs over time.
Publicly traded ABM helps manage offices, industrial buildings, shopping centers, warehouses, airport terminals, gyms, schools, parking garages, stadiums and government buildings.
The company has about $3.5 billion in yearly sales and had a recent market value of $1.2 billion.
Bonus on Broadcom Buy
A newly minted member of Broadcom Corp.’s team landed a prestigious engineering award.
Arogyaswami Paulraj, who joined Broadcom when the chipmaker bought Santa Clara-based Beceem Communications Inc. last month, was the recipient of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers’ Alexander Graham Bell Medal, the group’s highest honor.
Paulraj, a cofounder of Beceem, was selected “for pioneering contributions to the application of multi-antenna technology to wireless communications systems,” the company said.
Broadcom is big on boosting its engineers and has its own hall of fame that recognizes employees’ achievements, including patents they’ve been awarded and other plaudits.
“As a community of engineers, we at Broadcom are delighted and honored by the IEEE’s selection of Dr. Paulraj for the Bell Medal,” Broadcom cofounder and Chief Technical Officer Henry Samueli said. “This is an outstanding achievement.”
Beceem Communications makes chips for fourth-generation mobile phones.
After the deal closed last month, Paulraj stayed on as a senior technical advisor to Broadcom.
Paulraj is the author of two text books and more than 400 research papers, and holds more than 50 patents.
He’s an emeritus professor at Stanford University, where he supervises the smart antennas research group.
Bits and Pieces
Irvine-based Solarflare Communications Inc., a startup maker of Ethernet networking chips, recently raised $5 million in debt funding, according to a regulatory filing. No other details were given. Solarflare makes networking chips that help bridge older data networks to newer, faster ones … Irvine’s WebVisible Inc., which helps businesses buy and target online ads, is continuing its management shakeup. It recently named James Harper as finance chief. In October, WebVisible promoted Chief Operating Officer Ron Burr to chief executive after Kristen Mangers stepped down … Santa Ana circuit board maker TTM Technologies Inc. added Philip Franklin as a new director. He fills the spot left by Richard Beck, who will end his term in May. Franklin is the chief financial officer of Chicago’s Littelfuse Inc., a maker of circuit protection devices and other electronics.
