Rumor: Zynga snags an EA executive, COO John Schappert

When you're competing against a monolithic company, you can't just buy them out like the rest. Though, no one ever said you can't buy out their employees. According to a Reuters report, Zynga has swept EA's chief operating officer, John Schappert, right from underneath the almost 30-year-old company's feet. The report cites "a source close to the matter," and mentions that a regulatory filing shows that the COO resigned from his EA position on Monday. (Geez, you'd think a major executive would take a little vacay every once in a while.)

This is far from the first time the Zynga has lured in an ex-EA senior employee. In 2009, the company took on former EA Los Angeles general manager Mike Verdu. And in 2010, Zynga reeled in Steven Chiang, who before that worked at EA Sports as vice president for a whopping 15 years. Colin Sebastian, an analyst for Lazard Captial Markets, says, "we see little near-term risk that the departure will impact EA's upcoming product releases."

The COO worked with EA for almost two years, and was a Microsoft employee for two more years prior, according to Reuters. Unfortunately, it's unknown what role Schappert might take on at Zynga. Regardless, this is certainly an about-face for Schappert, who just a year ago was preaching the good news of the triple-A games industry to VentureBeat. Perhaps, like all of us at times (because, you know, we're human), he saw bigger dollar signs elsewhere. We've contacted Zynga for comment.

[Via and Image Credit: SF Chronicle]

Do you think Schappert is smart to move from EA to Zynga? What do you expect he will be up to in his new home?

RockYou gobbles up 3 Blokes (Studios) for combat Facebook games

No, Redwood City, Calif.-based social game publisher RockYou did not eat three British folk, but purchased Australian game developer 3 Blokes Studios for an undisclosed amount, TechCrunch reports. The studio has created four Facebook games to date including the 200 thousand-strong Galactic Trader (pictured). 3 Blokes will operate remotely and create combat strategy social games for the publisher to combat opponents like Kabam, Firaxis and even Zynga with its Empires & Allies release.

We can't help but notice how RockYou is rapidly adapting to the competition. First, it signs on a big-time designer like John Romero with Loot Drop (Zynga has Brian Reynolds), then it begins to buy up smaller studios to increase its development strength and diversity (Zynga bought 14 companies in 12 months). No details on specific games were announced, but we're sure that, if RockYou really wants to compete, they'll be just as strong as the rest.

Do you think RockYou is doing the right thing in attempting to emulate Zynga's progression? Will it lead to success for them?