Twitch’s Andy Swanson joins Discord as head of publisher relations

Voice and text chat app Discord has appointed industry veteran Andy Swanson as head of publisher relations. In this newly created role, Swanson will be responsible for reaching out to both developers and publishers on how they can best use the company’s chat service in their business.

Previously, Swanson was one of the launch members of the Twitch Media Group, where he was in charge of educating publishers and developers on the fast-moving livestreaming industry. He’s also worked at GameFly, Ubisoft and Future Publishing’s US arm.

AsDiscord has grown, we’ve continuously had publishers and game developers asking us how to best interact with our community of 45 million gamers," said Jason Citron, founder and CEO of Discord.

"Working with these publishers is a critical part of our vision to help players connect with their friends through gaming. Andy’s experience working with game creators will allow us to make sure that our voice and text SDK and community server best practicesreach the right people and help them tap into and engage the best gaming communities.”

Swanson added: Discord has a rapidly growing community of gamerswho are voracious users and fans of the product. My goal is to educate and connect the game creator ecosystem, encompassing publishers and developers of all shapes and sizes, to Discord and their authentic and passionate player community to make even more connections through gaming.”

Discord recently celebrated more than 45m registered users on the platform after just two years on the market. With 8.9m people sending over 200m messages each day, it’s become a key communication tool for gamers, and it also hosts large dedicated servers to popular games such as World of Warcarft, Overwatch, Rocket League, League of Legends and Clash Royale.