Senior Advisor - Deal-Making
François Masciopinto
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The main thing that sticks in my mind, the first one, is that as long as it’s not signed, it is not signed. The second thing is that you should never give up trying. Some of the best deals we made were last minute when all was thought to be lost.
Skills
Strategic Analysis
Reading People
Deal Negotiation
Empathy
Key achievements
- Helped sign more than a 100 titles for both publishers and developers
- Credited in way too many titles
- Helped save hundreds of jobs and create thousands
- Turned small studios into development powerhouses, such as Saber that went from 15 to more than 600 at the time of their sale to Embracer
- Helped creating hundreds of million of Euros valuations for ISM clients
On the lookout for
It is all about Vision and a management that understands it, wants to implement it and is smart enough to listen to people whilst sticking to said vision.
Backstory
Francois has spent over eighteen years in the interactive entertainment business, working as the director of A&R and business development at Atari/Infogrames, marketing manager for Canal+, and in product management positions at Phillips Media and Ubisoft. During his tenure at Atari, Francois managed new business development, overseeing financial analysis, due diligence and legal reviews for external game development studios. At ISM, he has been responsible for the signing of some of the best development studios in the world such as Saber, Asobo, Digital Extremes or Supermassive games. The company where he is a partner has achieved more than 2 billion euros in contracts which generated hundreds of million of Euros in royalties. He also helped advise his clients in M&A that resulted in generating 1,4 billion Euros valuation for ISM’s clients.