Jason Oberfest, the SVP of Business Development at MySpace has quit to join Ngmoco as the VP of social applications. Ngmoco is a company that makes iPhone games that hired the President of SEGA Simon Jeffery in June. Oberfest will be developing and discovering social games that can be adapted into mobile devices. No word yet over who will replace Oberfest at MySpace.
Oberfest joined MySpace in July 2008 and was the general manager of MySpace Open Platform. Before working at MySpace, he was the managing director of business development at LATimes.com.
Ngmoco is an iPhone that raised $10 million in funding back in March. Ngmoco games include Rolando 2, TouchPets Dogs, Topple, DropShip, Doctor Awesome, Word Fu, and Maze Finger.
Ngmoco also launched a publishing network called Plus+. Ngmoco has taken their company to the next level by hiring SEGA President and COO Simon Jeffery. Before SEGA, Jeffery was President of LucasArts. At Ngmoco, Jeffery will be Chief Publishing Officer. Ngmoco’s CEO Neil Young is also a former exec at Electronic Arts.
Ngmoco also plans on launching a social gaming network called the Plus+Network. Players on the Plus+Network will be able to create profiles, add friends and followers, and monitor leaderboards.
Booyah is an iPhone application development startup company that is based in Palo Alto, Calif. The company was founded by Keith Lee, Brian Morrisroe and Sam Christiansen, who have all had some sort of gaming experience. Lee was one of the head developers for the Diablo III franchise. Booyah recently announced that they have raised $4.5 million in Series A funding from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers’s iFund initiative.
“We were immediately compelled by the promise of Booyah and the background of the founders,” stated Kleiner Perkins partner Matt Murphy in a press release. “The iFund was created to help build the most promising and innovative businesses that utilize the discrete capabilities of the iPhone and iPod touch. Booyah is a terrific example.”
Last month Kleiner Perkins invested in Ngmoco, another iPhone gaming company. Booyah has not announced when their product will be launching, but it is expected to revolve around MMO. Booyah currently has beta sign ups on their website.
Ngmoco, the company behind Rolando, Wordfu, Topple, and several other iPhone games is taking their company to the next level by raising $10 million in funding. The company has been around for about 9 months and this is their second round of funding. The funding was led by Norwest Venture Partners.
This investment further proves that iPhone game development is a good way to go. Ngmoco is based in San Francisco and was founded by former Electronic Arts executive Neil Young. “Everything in this market happens so quickly,” stated Young. “The iPhone is really the first wave of new phones that have the same capability to play games as the handheld game systems have.”
Ngmoco’s previous round of funding was about $5 million from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers along with Maple Investments. The new round of funding will be used to expand Ngmoco’s premium games such as Rolando, which sells for $9.99. Ngmoco has made five top 10 games for iTunes thus far.
