IVGC Start of the Season - what can be expected to happen in 2025

Dr. Jan Storgårds is the Course Leader, 6-time entrepreneur, Director of CADGI ltd. (Cambridge Academy of Games and Innovation) and Cambridge Gamechanger ltd. He has over 25 years of experience working in the industry and academia with high technology companies and technology cluster development, including video games and gamification. He holds a Dr.Sc. in information systems science in computer game development from Aalto University, Finland. In his prior role as Sector Lead for Creative and Digital Industries at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, his responsibility was to engage ARU with Cambridge’s world-class technology cluster, including video games and gamification. Before this role, he was a visiting research fellow and currently a mentor at Cambridge Judge Business School (University of Cambridge) working with start-ups and early-stage technology companies, including video game studios. He also evaluates European Commission funded multimillion SME grant proposals.

James Shepherd is CEO of Cypherdelic, award winning creative executive. James has received Baftas and a Develop award for his outstanding executive work and has delivered multi-million selling products. As Head of the nDreams Studio, James was responsible for delivering cutting edge VR products, Ghostbusters: Rise of the Ghost Lord (PSVR2/ Quest 2-3), Synapse (PSVR2, 77% Metacritic), Fracked (PSVR and Meta Quest 2-3, 71% Metacritic, 88% Quest Score) and Far Cry: Dive into Insanity. (Location based shooter). Previously at Microsoft he ran the key Xbox One and Xbox live games community Upload, generating a 6.5 million user base, and over 10+ million views in the 12 months launch window. At Sony he had over 5 years’ experience as director of a multi-project development studio, releasing triple 'A' products on all PlayStation platforms, equally at home with production and creative issues; directing the vision and strategic planning on a diverse range of game and non-game projects such as Upload, Heavenly Sword (PS3, 1.6m units, 79% Metacritic), Play-TV, Killzone Mercenary (PSVIta, 78% Metacritic ) and LittleBigPlanet (PSP, 2.5m units, 87% Metacritic).

Matthew Dickson is the CTO of Cypherdelic. He has over 10 years of coding experience on triple-A titles for Sony PlayStation, including Killzone 2, Little Big Planet and Heavenly Sword. He also developed and published the iOS game Super Jackfruit, including all art and game programming.Currently the Lead Programmer, with Polygon Treehouse, makers of Bafta nominated Roki (PC and Switch 76% Metacritic) and the upcoming release, Myth wrecked Ambrosia Island. Matthew’s polymath expertise makes him ideally suited to delivering a game development course.