SANTA MONICA, Calif., April 5, 2011 — Jirbo Inc., a leading social entertainment and media company at the forefront of iPhone development since 2007 and backed by Insight Venture Partners, announced today that marketing and interactive entertainment veteran Will Kassoy has been named Chief Executive Officer.
In this role, Kassoy will oversee Jirbo, Inc’s operational management including their app gaming division, Jirbo, which has over 32 million downloads including 48 titles breaking in to the top 1% of Apple’s All Time Most Popular list. His responsibilities also include overseeing the recently-launched premium advertising network called AdColony. AdColony delivers high definition video ads to millions of app consumers, including the industry’s first Video-for-Virtual-Currency SDK, which offers a brand new way for app publishers to monetize social games. He will assume this position from founder, Jonathan Zweig who will become President of Jirbo, Inc.
Kassoy joins Jirbo, Inc. from Activision Blizzard, the world’s largest video game publisher, where he served a number of Senior Vice President roles including Strategic Growth and Head of Global Brand Management. In these roles Mr. Kassoy was responsible for leading Activision’s global marketing, media research, marketing communications, business development and setting long term business goals for emerging platforms. During his 13 years with Activision Blizzard, Kassoy was responsible for guiding some of the largest entertainment properties in history including Call of Duty, Tony Hawk, Marvel and Guitar Hero.
“Will brings his extensive experience from Activision Blizzard to the CEO position at Jirbo and will be invaluable in growing both our app development and AdColony business units,” said Jonathan Zweig, President of Jirbo Inc., “We’re confident that his skill set is exactly what we need to assume leadership in this thriving new market.”
“As the mobile and social games markets continue to explode, I’m eager to jump in and take on this new challenge,” said Will Kassoy. “AdColony’s innovative premium mobile ad technology will be a tremendous advantage for both advertisers and app publishers and I’m confident we can turn it into the new gold standard for generating revenue in mobile social gaming.”