Activision Blizzard is about to make an 'aggressive' push into consumer products recognising the power of its gaming brands
At the core of any leading video games developer is a few core franchise beloved by devout fans. Activision Blizzard has more than its fair share of iconic series and it has now identified a potentially lucrative revenue stream beyond gaming and eSports.
Activision Blizzard
The gaming giant behind, to mention a few, ‘Call of Duty,’ ‘Overwatch,’ ‘World of Warcraft,’ ‘Destiny,’ ‘Candy Crush’ and ‘Hearthstone’, is looking to lessen its dependency on the success of its gaming releases in a somewhat turbulent triple A market by creating a department devoted to consumer products.
To lead the charge into merchandising, succeeding the studio’s bold push into film with the critical (but not commercial flop) of the ‘Warcraft’ movie, and it’s growing dominance of eSports, the company has hired a Tim Kilpin to lead a new consumer products department.
As a former executive of Disney and Mattel, Kilpin will bring to the table a breadth of knowledge that will help bringing some of gaming’s top avatars to life as merchandise, books, apparel and more.
Kilpin promised an aggressive expansion in an interview with Reuters: "It's going to be about the opportunity to grow this business more quickly, to be more aggressive about how we bring this business across, that's how I'm approaching this at the outset."