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MCV INTERVIEW MIKE HAYES, PRESIDENT, SEGA WEST
The best of both worlds Mike Hayes has a lot on his plate after stepping up from his Euro role to oversee Sega’s entire Western business. Colin Campbell asks him how he’s finding life in his new San Francisco office – and handling the tricky job of managing two territories... TWO YEARS AGO, Sega moved its US HQ from swanky downtown San Francisco, to the up-coming Potrero Hill neighbourhood; a blue-collar district best known as the home of Anchor Steam Beer. It's a practical, unpretentious place, peppered with old warehouses from the dockland days, and with a good view of the Bay Bridge. For Mike Hayes, head of Sega of America, Potrero Hill is also a sub-$30 ride to SFO airport, useful when he pops back to his other office – in Brentford, Middlesex. There, he’s also head of Sega Europe. Phew! Stamina, and an ability to get stuck into some good old-fashioned hard work, is going to count for Hayes and for Sega in the months and years ahead. Since the departure of former US boss Simon Jeffery and a management restructure, Hayes has been given responsibility for both Sega’s EMEA and American businesses, known informally as Sega West. His job is to run Sega’s operations in all major territories outside Japan. This is cause for a rolling up of sleeves. Sega has much to do, including energising its key franchises to take advantage of both young/new consumers and retro-platforms like digital/iPhone as well as hauling itself into profitability. Parent company Sega Sammy dropped the best part of $100 million last year. With much of the loss Pachinko-based, and with a stagnant Japanese games market, the onus is on Hayes to deliver. Although not at liberty to divulge details, he says that Sega West “performs very well” within the group’s diverse operations, and is upbeat about the games industry as a whole and Sega’s place within the business, which he’s been working for 20-odd years.
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across the pond. But this is his first time intimately involved in the US. He talks about some of the major differences between North America and Europe with the caveat that they share more similarities and, when you compare the US with the UK, the differences (scale aside) become most difficult to spot. “The most interesting difference is the retail market. In EMEA we sell to more countries than there are customers UNITED THINKING [retailers] in North America. There are a Naturally, the availability of these few customers in the US who dominate potential revenue streams is no the games market which is different guarantee of success, but with its rich from many countries, but increasingly heritage and undoubted development the way the UK is becoming.” abilities, Sega inhabits a unique place. The US is ahead when it comes to how highly powerful, info-rich retailers run the The markets are so different. business. “There’s a shift In EMEA we sell to more towards what the consumer velocity of sale countries than there are is going to be at an early retailers in North America. period rather than ‘let’s Mike Hayes, Sega take as much stock as we can and see what sells’,” he explains. “We have to use our resources wisely “The level of sophistication of and intelligently to make sure that we information and tracking is advanced are getting those profits,” says Hayes. here compared to most of Europe. It’s “Now is a good time to be doing that as all about hard data on what the long as costs begin to stabilise and as consumer wants and what the long as the market remains buoyant.” consumer expects.” He is confident that, despite a quiet Buzz, as measured by metrics, as well summer in the games industry, the as pre-orders, ordain games. The packaged goods part of the business will marketing does the work, not the match calendar 2008, not including salesperson. “Retail becomes so digital and iPhone sales. For Sega, once important to us because of the channel a hardware company in its own right, marketing that they can do and making the correct strategy is to embrace as sure that product is front and centre so many distribution platforms as possible. that when we are ready to launch a “To think that we are going to get a big game the consumer is there. It’s very return on one format would be a fragile much a marketing business in terms of strategy,” says Hayes. getting sales success.” Hayes spent some time working the Hayes acknowledges some of the oftUS market during his Codemasters days, cited clichés about America and Europe, when the company was bringing its the former being slightly more hardcore biggest turn-of-the-Century franchises and the latter a bit more family-centric. “Of course profitability is what we are all after. But it’s worth looking at where the business is right now. A few years ago we were providing games for PlayStation 2 and a GameBoy device. Now we have three viable home console platforms; for us, a vibrant PC market with Total War and Football Manager; two great handhelds, Apple iPhone, digital and casual games. We have so many different market outlets.”
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