Future hires two Entertainment publishers

Future Publishing has hired two new publishers for its Entertainment portfolio.

James Kick has been promoted to associate publisher for OPSM, PSM3, Firstplay and the Golden Joystick Awards, while Don Ditri returns to the company as associate publisher digital, taking responsibility for CVG, GamesRadar and the ONM and OXM websites.

We spent a lot of time looking for the right people for these roles and I’m delighted with the calibre of appointment,” said group publisher Simon Maxwell.

James is extremely talented and illustrates the strength-in-depth the company has, while we know all about Don’s capabilities from his first spell at Future. We’re now very well placed to realise everything we have planned and drive our brands to new heights.”

Kick joined Future in 2008 to oversee the games marketing team. Since then he has directed several strategic campaigns, including the launch of FirstPlay and growing the number of consumer voters for the Golden Joystick Awards to 1.54m last year.

Due to the wide variety of media touchpoints we’re working across, it’s a brilliant time to be stepping into a publishing role,” said Kick. It’s going to be a great year for SCEE and I’m excited by the challenge of driving essential games media brands forward.”

Meanwhile, Ditri previously worked at Future as digital marketing manager, before then becoming ad sales manager on CVG and GamesRadar. He left the company in 2009 to join CBS Interactive, where he worked on brands such as GameSpot UK.

Don said: Future is unquestionably one of the world’s leading games media companies. In an exciting year of expansion and development, I’m looking forward to helping drive forward its truly unique cross-media portfolio.”