September 2026's Movers and Shakers: Scopely, Niantic Spatial, Trailmix, Roblox, Zynga and more

To keep you up to date with the latest movers and shakers in the mobile games industry, we've put together a regular roundup of the latest hires, promotions and, in some cases, exits.

If you've recently joined a company or bagged a big promotion, or you're an employer that's just made a hire, drop us an email at news@pocketgamer.biz.

Chief and director roles at Niantic Spatial and Tactile Games

Dave Citron has joined Niantic Spatial as chief product officer, bringing more than 20 years of experience in building and scaling products - for both consumers and businesses.

During his career, Citron has helped scale the Gemini App for Google DeepMind, led Gemini’s expansion into business, enterprise and education, and helped scale Google Duo from early stage to 120 million daily active users and three billion installs.

Most recently, Citron has served as corporate VP of product at Microsoft AI, where he worked on the Superintelligence team. He was involved in building and launching Microsoft’s first frontier foundation models, which now run in production across Microsoft 365, GitHub Copilot, Bing and more.

"AI is remarkably good at reading and writing, but it still doesn't understand the physical world well enough to act in it safely. Niantic Spatial has the research, the data and the commercial traction to close that gap and become the spatial layer for physical AI," said Citron.

"That's the work I've spent my career preparing for and I couldn't be more excited to be joining the team at such an exciting time."

Selin Sagim Azak has been promoted to publishing director at Tactile Games.

She joined the team this January as product and publishing manager, building on prior experience as Homa’s senior publishing manager. Earlier in her career, Azak has also worked as a game analyst for Gamegos and held various positions at Rollic, including senior game manager.

At Tactile Games, she’s been working as a bridge between external studios and internal teams, building the company’s publishing arm from the ground up. She’s also been supporting teams with building and scaling puzzle games.

Expanding and returning at The New York Times and Scopely

After six years serving as SVP, head of games at The New York Times, Jonathan Knight has been promoted to the expanded role of chief games officer.

During his time with the company, Knight has been involved in the creation and launch of Crossplay, has overseen games’ impact on The New York Times’ revenue and subscriber growth, and also led the acquisition and integration of Wordle.

"I’m happy to share that I’m taking on the expanded role of chief games officer at The New York Times. I’m so grateful for the continued opportunity to support this vital institution in its crucial mission to seek the truth and help people understand the world," he posted on LinkedIn.

Chase Shi has returned to Scopely after more than six years away, taking on the role of VP, head of game product.

He’s "building something ambitious" for the studio and is currently hiring across a range of product roles, working on an "exciting project". The move follows more than five years spent at Blizzard Entertainment, where he worked primarily on the Diablo franchise. Shi initially left Scopely to join Jam City, where he led the product roadmap for the studio’s first midcore title World War Doh.

"Thrilled to be driving such an ambitious and exciting project. Making games has always been what energises me most - time to build something truly different, from 0 to 1, all over again," he posted on LinkedIn.

Art and talent acquisition at Trailmix and Roblox

Trailmix has hired Johanna Cranston to the role of senior game artist, bringing experience from Tripledot, Supersolid, Ubisoft Shanghai and more.

During her time in the industry, Cranston has provided concept art, UI and game art, redesigned established characters for new genres and led research around AI-assisted art workflows.

"Johanna is an incredibly talented artist with a brilliant eye for character, detail and bringing ideas to life. She’ll be bringing her creative perspective and craft to our games, bringing their worlds and stories to life," Trailmix posted on LinkedIn.

Roblox has hired Connie Cormier as VP of talent acquisition. She has more than two decades of experience in building talent acquisition strategies across high-tech and life science industries.

Most recently, Cormier worked as global head of talent acquisition at Waymo. Prior to that, she spent more than six years at Ancestry. She has also worked as a senior technical recruiter at Amazon Web Services.

"Looking forward to building on a strong existing team and foundation, and to this next chapter.  Roblox's scale and ambition make this a great place to keep pushing on what great talent acquisition can look like," Cormier posted on LinkedIn.

New positions at Loom Games, Scopely, Zynga and more

Okan Akdoğan has joined Loom Games as a senior software engineer, while Emre Akter has come aboard as a senior data analyst. Loom Games has also promoted Ömer Faruk Gözübüyük to senior software engineer.

Mac Byczynski has taken on the role of VP of business development and global partnerships at BoomBit, while his role at AppLifters stays the same.

Jonathan Marcelino has joined Scopely as director of product for Monopoly Go. Luca Colonnelli has joined as a product manager in the MBA product leadership rotational programme, meanwhile Neb Mitrikeski has joined Scopely as a lead product manager.

Anagh Acharya has been hired as 3D art generalist at Zynga. Meanwhile, Daniel Loane has joined the company as a principal game designer. Eylül Dilan Gültekin is now a product specialist at the studio.

GDC Festival of Gaming has added four new members to its advisory board, namely 1Up Ventures general partner Amir Satvat, lead writer and narrative designer Alexa Ray Corriea, Fractional COO at Dragon Snacks Games Lucien Parsons, and Zebra Partners co-founder and partner Perrin Kaplan.

Room 8 Group has hired Eric Lacroix as senior business development director.

Ceren Dörtkardeşler has joined Spyke Games as a QA specialist.

Kerim Figanioglu has joined Tripledot Studios as a senior product manager.

Melike Çetinsöz has been hired by Voodoo as a as senior 2D artist.

New appointments at Miniclip, Grand Games, Rovio and more

Ozan Demirel has joined Miniclip as a senior game designer.

Product Madness has hired Gerard Torrent as a data scientist.

Dan Harrison has been hired as senior enemy systems designer at NaturalMotion Games.

Ayşe Ersavaş has joined Grand Games as a product specialist.

Nancy Lin has been hired by Zynga as senior marketing data analyst.

Yodo1 Games has hired Christy Chen as a project operations manager, brands in games.

Supercell has hired Karzan Schippers as a data analyst.

Rachael Grant’s role at Trailmix as marketing lead has been made permanent, after originally joining the studio in late 2025.

Berkay Özer has joined Fomo Games as head of studio.

Wille Miljas has been promoted to director of product marketing at Rovio’s Stockholm studio.

Stephanie A has been promoted to principal data analyst at King.

Hossein Taghavi has joined Roblox to lead economy ML efforts.

Sunil Kalotia has joined Square Enix as a marketing manager.

End of an era at Rovio and Trailmix

Rovio VP of global marketing Luis de la Camara is set to leave the flock after five years, departing from the leadership team to move to a new country with his wife. Her own work has seen them move to the Netherlands, where Camara plans to work in the B2B ad tech space.

"Laura has several times moved with me abroad, to Stockholm, Dundee and Málaga, because of my gaming career. So it's my turn to return the favour," he posted on LinkedIn.

Camara made the decision to resign in late June, with his time at Rovio now coming to an end in the next few weeks. He’s described Rovio as career-defining. Camara played a part in the longevity of the Angry Birds brand, leading global marketing across product, performance marketing, community management, UX research and more.

PocketGamer.biz interviewed Camara back in January at Pocket Gamer Connects London 2026, discussing brand power, scalability, Angry Birds on Apple Arcade and more.

After almost nine years leading Trailmix, founder and CEO Carolin Krenzer has transitioned into the role of executive chair. While she will no longer lead the company, she will remain committed to its success.

Krenzer established Trailmix in late 2017 and has selected James Nicholas to serve as the new CEO after building a strategy together, preparing the company for the next era of games. Nicholas has spent 3.5 years as Trailmix’s COO and has known Krenzer for over a decade, having previously worked with her at King.

When Krenzer hired him to Trailmix in 2023, she did so "knowing he’d be a great person to succeed me one day".

The company’s flagship mobile game Love & Pies has just celebrated its fifth anniversary.

Directing and growing at Funday Games and Tripledot Studios

Marc Cartwright has joined Funday Games as the studio’s new game director. He brings plenty of experience from directorial roles across Jagex, CI Games and Tarsier Studios, with two decades of industry experience overall.

During his career, Cartwright has helped ship games for Nintendo, PlayStation and Xbox systems as well as PC and browser-based platforms. He’s been involved in indies and Triple-A, titles for retail, subscription-based games and free-to-play.

Now at Funday, he will be working on a brand-new project.

"With his extensive experience and passion for creating great games, we’re thrilled to have him on board. Marc will be helping us kick off a brand-new project, and we’re truly excited to collaborate with him and see where this new journey takes us," Funday Games posted on LinkedIn.

Samantha Benjamin has moved from Supersonic to Tripledot Studios, starting a new position as VP of growth.

She’s been serving under the Unity and ironSource umbrella for almost nine years, working across a number of roles in that time such as senior director of growth, director of growth and product monetisation, and director of growth and live ops.

"The last few years at Supersonic have been an incredible learning journey. From product monetisation and game economy to growth, UA and creative, I’ve had the chance to dive into so many different sides of the gaming business," Benjamin posted on LinkedIn.

"I’m looking forward to continuing to build Supersonic, leading creative, UA and ad monetisation, and taking the studio to the next level together with Tripledot."

Appointments at Women in Games and 52 Entertainment

Anastasia Kuprina has become an ambassador for Women in Games, one month on from joining WildCard Games as senior product manager. Her career has spanned a range of roles across Rovio, Scopely, Seriously Digital Entertainment as well as self-employment.

Kuprina thanked a number of women who have supported her throughout her time in the industry, such as RZAIN Consulting’s Claire Rozain, Sybo’s Izzy Miller and Rovio’s Sylvia Rantala and Elif Bozdağ.

"Throughout my career, I was supported by amazing women and I wouldn't have gotten where I am without them," Kuprina posted on LinkedIn.

"The point of the ambassador role for me is to pay it forward, mostly around product and mentorship. More on that soon."

Matthieu Jacquier has been appointed president of 52 Entertainment, leading the group and its ambitions across B52, Virtual Regatta and Squared divisions. Squared was launched this February as a new division fully dedicated to creating and developing casual games.

Jacquier has joined 52 Entertainment from Auditeur IHEDN. He also brings experience from Match Group and other international digital businesses.

"I am very pleased to join 52 Entertainment and its teams. The group has strong brands, highly engaged communities and remarkable expertise across very different gaming universe," he said.

Jacquier has taken on the president role as Olivier Comte has stepped away from the position after eight years.

The latest promotions

Erik Meurk has been promoted to senior software engineer at King, with a focus on Minecraft Blast. Andreas Jansson has also been promoted, shifting from director of engineering to senior director of engineering at the company.

Meanwhile, King also promoted Stephanie A to the role of principal data analyst.

Wille Miljas has been promoted to director of product marketing at Rovio.

After a summer internship, Rahamat Zaman has been appointed to the role of software engineer 1 at Xsolla.

Hires at Zynga, Jam City, Unity and more

Aybars Doker has moved from Miniclip from Zynga, serving as lead product manager.

Carissa Gonzalez has joined Jam City as director of growth marketing.

Joe Gabriel has joined Unity as senior technical product manager over the Android XR integration and Google partnership.

Khaled Zakaria has joined Roblox as developer relations manager for the Middle East, North Africa and Türkiye. Connie Cormier has joined as VP of talent acquisition.

Marta Jover Valero is now a full-time junior outsourcing coordinator at Gameloft Barcelona.

Halil Kesmez has been hired as lead data engineer at Cypher Games.

Matt Dobill has been appointed director of applied AI at Epic Games.

Nikita Fesyukov has joined Tripledot Studios as legal counsel.

New appointments at Supercell, Loom Games, Apple and more

Mateusz Janczewski has joined Supercell as a game producer.

Salman Dar has become Apple’s head of government affairs for Pakistan.

Borja Guillan returned to King as senior creative director in Stockholm, after four years away at Tribo Games.

Baris Girgin has joined Loom Games as marketing director.

Jamie Kampel has joined Sony Pictures Entertainment as EVP, head of consumer products and licensing.

Mitch Zamara has joined Fateless Games as lead economy designer.

Thomas Bringer has been hired by Voodoo as a game developer for a midcore PvP mobile game.

Jordan Cater has joined Secret Mode as social and community manager.

High-level shifts at Savvy and Moloco

Brian Ward is stepping down from his position as Savvy Games Group CEO after half a decade with the company. Since 2021, he has overseen its investments, acquisitions and expansion across games and esports - including the $4.9 billion acquisition of Scopely.

During Ward’s time at the helm, Savvy also came to own geolocation giant Pokémon Go through Scopely, as part of a $3.5bn deal in 2025.

Ward informed staff that the time has come for new leadership. The deputy governor of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund Turqi Alnowaiser will serve as interim acting CEO of Savvy Games Group until a new leader is found.

Moloco has appointed Rachel Glaser to its board of directors, bringing experience as a financial leader across a range of digital marketplace and technology companies. Most recently, she served as Etsy CFO where she played a key role in driving several years of revenue and margin expansions.

Glaser also currently serves on the boards of The New York Times Company and CoStar Group as an independent director. Her appointment at Moloco is expected to help the AI advertising company move into its next phase of growth.

"Moloco has built truly differentiated AI technology, and because the business grows only when its customers do, that edge leads directly to sustainable, profitable growth. I look forward to helping the team build on that in the company's next chapter," said Glaser.

Entering new eras at Apple and Lion Studios

Phil Schiller has stepped down from his role at Apple after more than 30 years with the tech conglomerate. He served at Apple under both Steve Jobs and Tim Cook, originally joining in 1987 with only four years outside the giant since.

Schiller spent two decades as the senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing and has headed up the App Store since 2015, with the 2020s seeing him navigate the long lawsuit between Epic Games and Apple’s App Store fees.

Schiller is stepping down from his role but will remain involved with the company as an Apple fellow. He’ll be working on unspecified projects, although insiders told Bloomberg they believe it is a big step toward him ultimately retiring.

Cook has now also completed his final day as Apple CEO, after new leadership was announced in the spring. John Ternus has become Apple’s new CEO effective September 1st.

Lion Studios has appointed Tamara Feiman as CEO after six years with the company. Leading the studio’s next chapter, she’s taken over from Nicholas Le as he transitions to the role of studio chair - and PeopleFun’s new CEO.

During her years with Lion Studios, Feiman has advanced through a range of titles like EMEA business development lead, studio management director and general manager of publishing.

She helped develop partnerships with studios across EMEA, Turkey and APAC, while also leading a portfolio of more than 50 games including Coin Sort, Wordle! and Arrow Out.

"I’m fortunate to work alongside an incredible team across publishing, growth, product, engineering and market intelligence, as well as our talented studio partners around the world. I’m proud of what we’ve built together and excited about where we can take Lion next," Feiman posted on LinkedIn.

Strategy and finance at Scopely and King

Scopely has hired Tiana Clark as corporate strategy lead, bringing in experience and perspectives from outside the games industry.

A graduate of Harvard Business School, Clark has spent the past two years at Disney, first as an MBA intern of finance strategy and specialist projects for Walt Disney Imagineering. She proceeded to work at the Walt Disney Company as manager of Disney+ global subscriber growth and monetisation, focused on international markets like EMEA, LATAM and APAC.

"Last month, I joined Scopely as corporate strategy lead in the office of the co-CEOs. I'm thrilled to join this mobile games powerhouse and am excited to help drive what's next," she posted on LinkedIn.

King has hired Max Métral after 4.5 years spent at Activision Blizzard. In that time, he served as a strategic partner to Activision Blizzard’s finance organisation and led the go-to-market analytics and business intelligence team, bringing market insights and advanced analytics to assess commercial opportunities.

Now, he has joined King as commercial finance director.

"After an incredible journey across Activision Blizzard, I'm grateful for the people I've worked with, the challenges we've tackled and everything I've learned along the way," Métral posted on LinkedIn.

"Looking forward to partnering with the talented teams at King, helping shape the next phase of Portfolio growth across some of the world's most-loved games."

Major moves at 1Up Ventures, King, Loom Games and more

Amir Satvat has joined 1Up Ventures as a general partner, departing from his role as business development director at Tencent Games after three years.

Children’s interactive entertainment platform Lingokids has named Mathias Royer as its VP, bringing 15 years of experience in mobile games. The studio recently ranked in our Top 30 Iberia Game Makers list.

Lasse Seppänen has departed from Supercell after more than seven years, planning to start a new studio in 2027.

CodeDev Group has appointed Ben Board as CEO of its optimisation division The Performance Guys after almost nine years at Epic Games.

Kimz Zhang has joined Lion Studios as studio manager, focused on hybrid puzzle games and building partnerships with devs across China and APAC.

Arjun Varma has been hired by Roblox to lead developer relations in India and South Asia, building on experience at Meta and Microsoft.

The European Game Developers Federation has re-elected industry entrepreneur Hendrik Lesser as president for the period of 2026 to 2028.

Cansu Karahan Can has joined Loom Games as people and culture manager. Sila Turku Askin has been hired as senior performance marketing manager.

Joseph Morrone has returned to Zynga as a senior QA analyst after nine years away.

Esther Lopez has returned to King in a new role, now serving as principal VFX artist in the match-3 giant’s Barcelona office. Meanwhile, Ragnar Dunder has joined King in Sweden as a senior UI/UX designer.

Within King, David Howe has shifted focus from Farm Heroes Saga to Candy Crush, now serving as the game’s product strategy director.

After more than 12 years at King, Luis Russell has joined Huuuge Games as VP product.

Hires and promotions at Supercell, Miniclip, Playtika and more

Bruno Ribeiro has joined Miniclip as senior program manager.

Luran Zhang has been hired as a new community manager at Supercell.

Scopely has appointed Rodney Lopez as corporate development manager.

LoopMe has hired Molly Fett as a talent partner.

Varun Mathure has joined PlaySimple Games and Modern Times Group as chief marketing officer of the casual division.

Dimitra Papacosta has joined Yodo1 Games as social media and community manager for two game titles.

Wehype has appointed Janina Warsén as its new COO.

Voodoo has appointed Eren Nalçacı as general manager.

Fulya Kumlu is now a product specialist at Ace Games.

Nabib El-Rahman is now Discord’s VP of product, business.

Tim W has joined Adjust in the partnerships team for the Americas.

Matt Sattel has joined InMobi as SVP, head of revenue for North America.

Dilan Demirel has joined Pantheon Games as a QA specialist.

Wabantu Hlophe has been promoted to global games business operations lead for Google Play.

Christopher Kerr is stepping down as Game Developer’s senior news editor at the end of September.

Houston Whaley has been promoted to senior manager, mobile marketing at Activision.

AppsFlyer has appointed Hilla Schachtel to the position of data analyst.

Guy Bauer has joined Playtika as senior director of marketing for Slotomania.

Anni Chang has been promoted to producer one at Kabam.

Artists abound at Rollic, Grand Games, Tripledot and more

Rollic has hired Esma Özdemir as a 3D game artist.

Pelin Kiper has joined Grand Games as a UA artist.

Nicola Sirago has joined Tripledot Studios as lead technical artist.

Babil Games has appointed Adel Alhamwi as a technical 3D artist.

Meagan Taylor is now working for Wizards of the Coast as a senior UX designer on the Magic: The Gathering Arena team.