Infogrames Details Atari Board Changes

Officials from French publisher Infogrames have announced the appointment of Curtis G. Solsvig III as the new chief restructuring officer at 51 percent owned U.S. subsidiary Atari Inc., following the removal of all but three board members earlier in the month. Solsvig appears to have no previous experience of the games industry, but is currently managing director at global restructuring, consulting and financial advisory firm AlixPartners. AlixPartners has already been retained by Atari to assist in evaluating and implementing the company’s restructuring plans. At the same time, Wendell Adair, Eugene I. Davis, James B. Shein and Bradley Eric Scher were named as new independent directors at Atari. They will join the three extant board members Evence-Charles Coppée, Jean-Michel Perbet and Thomas Schmider. All four new directors will serve on a special committee of the board that will review “related party transactions”. As with Solsvig, none of the new board members have any experience in the games industry, with each instead coming from corporate finance, consulting and/or restructuring backgrounds. Davis has also been appointed as non-executive chairman, while Adair, Davis and Shein will serve on the audit committee of the board with Adair acting as chairman. Adair, Shein and Scher will also serve on the compensation and governance committee of the board, with Shein as chairman.