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EA gets a new soldier in the takeover fight

  • Posted byby Dean Takahashi
  • Updated
  • 1 min

gtagood3.jpgIt’s not wise to go without a consigliere in a mob war. That’s why Electronic Arts appointed Eric Brown as chief financial officer today. The Godfather himself, EA CEO John Riccitiello, needs Brown to run the numbers on taking over Take-Two Interactive. Yesterday, Take-Two’s board rejected EA’s $2 billion hostile tender offer as inadequate.

Brown, 42, worked in the late 1990s as chief operating officer and CFO for EA’s Redwood Shores studio. Before his latest appointment. Brown was CFO and chief operating officer at McAfee. He replaces Warren Jenson, 51, who wasn’t up for the gang war (our coverage). McAfee has said it has started its own search for a consigliere.

You know that saying. Jerry Sanders, former CEO of Advanced Micro Devices, once said to me, “Old men for counsel. Young men for war.”

Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.