Company: Unity Technologies, San Francisco, CA
Entry Submitted By: Point-Blank Communications
Company Description: Unity Technologies is revolutionizing the game industry with Unity, our breakthrough engine and development tools for creating multiplatform games, simulations, visualizations, and other interactive content. The company is focused on taking the pain out of game development with technology that is both uniquely usable and extremely powerful, crossing industries, platforms, and genres.
Nomination Category: Management Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Tech Innovator of the Year

Nomination Title: David Helgason, CEO and Co-founder

1. Tell the story about what this nominee achieved since January 1 2013 (up to 525 words). Focus on specific accomplishments, and relate these accomplishments to past performance or industry norms. Be sure to mention obstacles overcome, innovations or discoveries made, and outcomes:

David Helgason, CEO and Co-founder of Unity Technologies, passionately leads the company, inspiring all employees to carry out his vision of democratizing game development for the two million developers who have joined the Unity community. Helgason is the visionary behind Unity Technologies, the creator of Unity—a development platform used to make interactive experiences for desktop, web, mobile devices, and game consoles. He has pioneered the company’s mission to democratize game development for all developers, empowering them to compete in the market. With so many platforms and devices to build for, developers face big obstacles and high costs to build cross-platform, but Unity Technologies re-invests in its award-winning 2D and 3D development tools to level the playing field for them around the globe.

Additionally, Helgason has pushed groundbreaking business model innovations for Unity and his industry, now copied by most competitors. He empowers developers to make better games. From supporting multiple platforms to providing 2D and 3D tools, Unity is making it easy and affordable to build cross-platform games. For example, Unity comes in both free and affordable premium versions, generating enough revenue to keep Unity Technologies profitable and rapidly growing. What’s more, this business model has revolutionized the games business, offering innovative products at prices that have allowed developers of all sizes to adopt and stay with Unity.

In 2013, Unity announced they were building services to do the heavy lifting for game developers including easy-to-implement analytics, marketing, and monetization capabilities, enabling them to focus on development without requiring extra plug-ins. This way, they can take control of their gaming business, including distribution, user acquisition, and monetization, easily handling economic aspects previously not a part of their trade.

Also, in early 2013, Unity made its mobile technology products free, launched the Learn site, and created a subscription service. The company has been active in education and is being used in over 2,000 educational institutions, which means there are many professionals entering the market with Unity expertise.

Under Helgason’s stewardship, over the past two years, Unity:

• Tripled its user base, growing from one million to 3.3 million cross-platform global developers
• Attracted 600,000 monthly active users
• Is used by roughly 47 percent of developers (Source: McKinsey 2014)
• Has captured 45 percent of the full feature game engine market (Source: McKinsey 2014)
• Unveiled online services to help game developers of all sizes acquire new players, promote their games, and monetize their products; the services help developers create immersive experiences and connect millions of users across multiple platforms
• Acquired Applifier to bring Everyplay mobile social community and video replay service and GameAds Video Ads to Unity developers
• Acquired Tsugi to provide the foundation for the powerful Unity Cloud Build continuous integration service that helps developers quickly build, test, and share new game projects
• Acquired Playnomics to build new analytics tools that will provide valuable information to developers to help connect closely with their audiences to deliver targeted content, game improvements, and offers
• Made it free for mobile game developers to publish to iOS, Android, Windows Phone 8 and BlackBerry 10
• Partnered with Intel, Oculus, Google, Sony Computer Entertainment, Tizen, Facebook, Qualcomm, Samsung, and Microsoft to deliver new, incredible paths of delivery and opportunities for developers
• Announced and released versions of platform tools for Windows 8.1 apps, Tizen, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita and PlayStation®Mobile (PSM), and WebGL
• Entered and extended partnerships to make platform locked versions of Unity Pro free for approved Wii U, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation Vita developers
• Integrated with Facebook, making it easier for developers to take advantage of the social network’s platform for acquiring users, generating revenue, and more
• Released and introduced new 2D development tools specifically designed to streamline workflow
• Announced Unity 5, the next big iteration in the Unity development engine and editor that includes physically-based shading, real-time global illumination, a reworked audio system, improved 2D support, a 64-bit editor, WebGL support, Mecanim animation system improvements, and more.

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2. Provide a brief (up to 125 words) biography about the nominee:

David Helgason leads Unity Technologies in its mission to democratize game development through the best technology, the best tools, and the best business practices. Helgason has facilitated groundbreaking business innovation for Unity, which have revolutionized the games industry and are now widely imitated and adopted. Every day, he restlessly leads the global company’s future growth by focusing on the basics and channeling how they can lead to global domination. An ex-engineer, technologist, and visionary, he serves on the boards of several games and technology startups, speaks his mind about what he cares about most, and generally tries to make himself useful.