PlayStation boss Shawn Layden to keynote DICE next month

The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, the organization behind one of the most important game industry conferences in North America, has announced five new speakers for the DICE Summit this February, in addition to the theme: Trailblazers. Last year’s keynote speech was delivered by the head of Xbox, Phil Spencer, which tackled the importance of embracing diversity and advocating gaming for everyone.

Shawn Layden, chairman of Sony Interactive Entertainment Worldwide Studios, will be headlining the Summit as the keynote speaker. Much like every year at DICE, he will be joined by a number of different speakers from prominent studios around the game industry. AIAS has revealed three additional industry powerhouses that will join Amy Hennig, Greg Broadmore, Tim Schafer, and Yves Jacquier.

• Sarah Bond – Head of Global Gaming Partnerships and Development at Xbox/Microsoft. Bond leads Microsoft’s gaming business development team responsible for cultivating and managing Microsoft’s gaming partnerships, crafting and executing deals and negotiations, as well as, shaping gaming business development strategy and mergers and acquisitions.
• Stanley Pierre-Louis – Acting President and CEO of the Entertainment Software Association. In addition to leading the ESA until a permanent leader is announced, Pierre-Louis heads the legal, policy, and regulatory affairs function for the organization, which includes: advocacy on First Amendment, technology and intellectual property issues; supervision of a global content protection program; and responsibility for contractual matters. He also oversees all governance and compliance matters for the organization and serves as Corporate Secretary to ESA’s Board of Directors. Pierre-Louis’ will be discussing “What the WHO has wrong about video games.”
• Bryan Intihar, Creative Director at Insomniac Games for Marvel’s Spider-Man will be joining the AIAS Gamemaker’s Notebook podcast host
• Ted Price for a special live taping on the D.I.C.E. Summit stage. This podcast interview will feature an in-depth, one-on-one conversation on the business and craft of developing one of the biggest games from 2018.

This year’s DICE Summit takes place in Las Vegas during February 11-13. GameDaily is a media partner and will be in attendance.

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