Zynga hires former EA executive as its chief financial officer

Social mobile game publisher Zynga is announcing today it has hired games industry vet Gerard Griffin as chief financial officer.

Griffin spent the past 10 years at Electronic Arts, where he served as the No. 2 finance executive, working for EA CFO Blake Jorgensen. Earlier this week, Zynga disclosed that it had hired Doug Scott, another former EA marketer, as the chief marketing officer of Zynga.

Zynga has had a lot of executive turmoil. Zynga CEO Don Mattrick rotated through a lot of executives when he took over from Zynga founder Mark Pincus. But Mattrick left Zynga in April 2015, and Pincus returned to the top job. Then, in March 2016, Pincus hired former Electronic Arts executive Frank Gibeau as CEO. Since coming on board, Gibeau has replaced executives in the marketing, finance, publishing, and operations roles.

Besides Scott, new hires include Bernard Kim, president of publishing, and Matt Bromberg, chief operating officer. Griffin replaces David Lee, who resigned in November after serving for 18 months as CFO. Michelle Quejado served as interim CFO. Griffin will report to Gibeau.

“Gerard’s 25 years of financial experience and deep understanding of the games, media and technology industries will be instrumental to Zynga,” said Gibeau, in a statement. “His disciplined financial leadership and approach of working closely with teams to deliver high margin digital revenue, coupled with his ability to navigate business turnarounds, will help put us in a stronger position to achieve long-term growth.”

Griffin, 49, has more than two decades of industry experience in financial and operational management within the gaming, media and technology sectors. Before joining Zynga, Griffin spent more than 10 years at EA. Most recently, he served as senior vice president of finance, running finance for EA’s studios, marketing and publishing organizations.

“From all of us at EA, we want to congratulate Ger Griffin on his new role and thank him for 10 years with us. We wish him all the best,” said Blake Jorgensen, CFO at EA, in a statement.

Before that, he spent more than six years in Geneva, Switzerland as vice president and CFO for EA International. Prior to joining EA, Griffin held a number of senior finance roles domestically and internationally at technology and media companies, including NBC and Primedia, as well as in public accounting with KPMG.

“I’ve always had a passion for media and entertainment, and I’m incredibly excited by Zynga’s unique ability to connect people around the world through games,” said Griffin, in a statement. “With a strong portfolio of innovative IP, deep player relationships and incredible talent, the company is well positioned to be a leader in the growing mobile industry. I look forward to partnering collaboratively with Frank and the rest of the team to deliver on Zynga’s potential and long-term value through a player-first approach to building great games.”