Girls In Tech Presents: The World of Casual Games

During this down economy, one of the few industries that have continued to grow is casual online games.  Women are a dominant force in this industry, making up 75% of the population that pays to play.  It’s no wonder that casual games have become so popular – they’re easy to play, provide a quick hit of fun, and are highly social and viral in nature.

Have you ever wanted to know how to get involved in the super-hot gaming space?  Are you curious as to what the job opportunities are in games?  Do you want to get a sense of who the big players are and how they make money?  Or maybe you’re just asking yourself, what is the big deal with games – and why is everyone playing them and talking about them?!  If any of these questions apply to you then Girls in Tech has the perfect forum for you.

Girls in Tech Presents: The World of Casual Games
An online casual games panel featuring Zynga, Mochi Media, SGN, and Super Rewards

Our panel of casual gaming experts is ready to share with our members tips on how to get into games, how to make money in games, and what the growth trends look like for the casual gaming space.

Level 1 - The basics
The role of women in the growth of casual games and the landscape of dominant players in the industry

Level 2 - Earning extra lives
The Facebook and iPhone affect on casual games

Level 3 - Staying alive as the game gets harder
Evolving the casual games business strategy in today’s economic climate

The Finale - Making the Scoreboard
A sampling of games and words of advice for those who want in on the super-hot casual games industry

The Panelists:

Shervin Pishevar is the CEO of Social Gaming Network which has grown to tens of millions users on Facebook and over 12 million users on the iPhone with games such as iBowl. Shervin was the founding President/COO of Webs.com and helped scale Webs.com to over 30 million users.  He gained a BA from University of California at Berkeley where he founded the award winning Berkeley Scientific Journal and received his first of 4 patents based on his independent research.

Ada Chen is a Senior Product Marketing Manager at Mochi Media, the world’s largest casual gaming network.  Prior to joining Mochi Media she was part of Microsoft's adCenter team working with premium clients such as Netflix, Overstock, Blue Nile, and REI across retail, consumer packaged goods, education and insurance verticals. Ada received her undergraduate degree from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Sharyn Efimoff is the Director of Mobile Production at Zynga, a leading social gaming company.  She oversees the production of Zynga’s games on the iPhone and iPod Touch.  Prior to joining Zynga, Sharyn was a Senior Financial Analyst at A9 (an Amazon.com company), working on search and advertising projects. Sharyn received a Bachelors Degree with Honors in Electronics and Computer Systems Engineering from the University of Queensland, Australia, and a Masters of Business Administration from Harvard University.

Wally Nguyen is Director of Sales at Super Rewards, a leading virtual currency monetization platform for online games - from social gaming, virtual worlds, MMOs, to iPhone applications.  Prior to Super Rewards, Wally led the sales efforts for Panther Express, specializing in infrastructure and scaling efforts for the gaming and digital content markets. Wally holds a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration and Marketing from the University of Hayward, and an MBA from the University of San Francisco.

Moderator:

Joel Brodie is the founder and president of Gamezebo.com, a leading editorial site and community for casual games across all platforms. Previously, Joel was head of business development for Yahoo! Games, where he was responsible building numerous enterprising products, including Yahoo! Games Downloads, Games on Demand, and Video Games. Before that, Joel worked business development at Simutronics, a games company that was doing massively multiplayer games before they were cool. Joel graduated from University of Maryland with an undergraduate degree in economics and political science.

A BIG thanks to our sponsors:
Corporate Sponsor: Super Rewards- http://www.srpoints.com/ 
Media Sponsor: Inside Social Games- http://www.insidesocialgames.com/

Event Details:
Thursday, May 28, 2009
6:30pm Networking & wine
7:00pm Panel start
Location:
ngmoco office
118 King St., 4th Floor
San Francisco, CA