Tomb Raider exec Dominic Wheatley joins Kuju as CEO

Dominic Wheatley, co-founder of Domark (which eventually merged with other studios to become Eidos Interactive) and one of the management figures behind the original Tomb Raider, is now the CEO for UK-based independent developer Kuju Entertainment. Kuju is made up of three independent development studios: House of the Dead: Overkill team Headstrong Games, Chime developer Zoe Mode and Silent Hill: Downpour studio Vatra Games. Wheatley was already Chairman for Kuju, and CEO for Kuju parent Catalis -- however, he has now moved into a CEO role for Kuju in order to focus on high production value console and PC games at the company. Vatra currently develops the highest cost production games for Kuju, usually within the $16-20 million range, while Headstrong and Zoe Mode usually spend around $3 million and above. "We work with big players," said Wheatley, "but there are smaller publishers coming through too, with big ambitions. We're able to produce our own ideas and have them turn into multi million unit sellers like Art Academy and that is increasingly the way I see us going." Kuju has also hired Gary Bracey, previously vice president at Ocean Software before it was acquired by Infogrames, and development director at Telstar Electronic Studios.