Trip Hawkins

Trip Hawkins founded Electronic Arts in 1982 with the revolutionary vision that software developers were artists who deserved to be treated with the same respect as musicians or filmmakers, a philosophy that led him to pioneer premium packaging, high royalty rates, and developer-centric marketing in the nascent PC gaming industry.

Trip Hawkins, born on December 28, 1953, is an American entrepreneur and businessman who founded Electronic Arts in 1982 and later founded The 3DO Company in 1991. Before starting Electronic Arts, Hawkins was a marketing executive at Apple Computer, where he played a key role in the early success of the Apple II. Hawkins recognized the potential of the personal computer as an entertainment platform long before most of his peers, and he left Apple to create a publishing label that would elevate the quality and cultural status of computer games. Under his leadership, Electronic Arts grew into one of the largest and most influential video game publishers in the world, establishing a roster of legendary developers and pioneering the sports simulation genre with titles like John Madden Football. Hawkins left Electronic Arts in 1991 to found The 3DO Company, which attempted to create a new standard for home video game consoles but ultimately failed due to high hardware costs and fierce competition from Sony and Nintendo. Despite the failure of 3DO, Hawkins' impact on the video game industry is profound; his vision of treating game developers as artists and his insistence on high-quality, premium software laid the foundation for the modern interactive entertainment industry. He has since gone on to found or invest in numerous other technology and gaming companies, including Digital Chocolate, and remains a respected figure in the Silicon Valley and gaming communities.