MAY 29, 2009 • Just weeks after Infogrames sold Atari’s European business to Namco Bandai, Atari president Phil Harrison stepped down from overseeing daily operations of the division. Harrison, best known for his years with Sony’s PlayStation business, had been in the job for 14 months. Atari said Harrison will remain on its board as non-executive Director of the Group. Infogrames CEO David Gardner, and recently arrived COO Jeff Lapin, will lead the mostly U.S. focused Atari.
Impact: Phil Harrison helped build Sony Computer Entertainment into a major software publishing powerhouse. It was therefore a surprise that in early 2008 he came into the struggling Infogrames fold. Harrison came into an Atari that was clearly in need of a major turnaround. It would have been a daunting task under the best of times, but an economic meltdown clearly didn’t help matters.
