Update (February 23rd 2023): Guild Esports have announced three more changes to their senior leadership team today.
On February 27th 2023, Clare Jarvis will become Chief Financial Officer and Company Secretary. Clare is a chartered accountant with more than ten years of financial and senior management experience across the media and entertainment industries. She previously worked at Shazam and most recently worked as Senior Director of Finance for the UK and Canada at Audible, the Amazon-owned audio entertainment brand.
Also, Matthew ‘Charlie’ Charles has been appointed as Director of Operations, effective from March 1st 2023. Matthew joins Guild on a permanent basis having provided esports consultancy in an operations role since October 2022, as a seasoned senior executive with more than 17 years’ experience in high growth sports technology, production and media businesses.
And thirdly, Alun Vaughan has been appointed as Senior Communications Manager effective from March 6th 2023. Alun previously served as Senior Corporate Communications Officer at FIFA, where he led a number of communication strategies and developed centralised messaging to promote stakeholder activities.
Original article (January 11th 2023):
UK esports organisation Guild Esports have announced they’ve grown their senior leadership team with three new appointments.
The hires have been made to ‘support the next stage of the company’s growth’, and introduced by Jasmine Skee, whose appointment as CEO of Guild became effective at the start of 2023, following board changes at Guild Esports in November 2022.
Luke Jones has been appointed Director of Esports and Gaming at Guild Esports, effective from January 30th 2023. Luke previously worked as as Senior Gaming and Esports Manager at Formula One team Red Bull Racing and at Red Bull Technology, where he was responsible for leading strategic planning, new business development and execution of Red Bull Racing’s esports and gaming programme.
His additional experience includes working as Digital Partnerships Director at live event company Live Nation Entertainment, where he delivered advertising across its digital network and as Digital Account Manager at multimedia company Bauer Media Group.
Secondly, Nick Westwood has been appointed Senior Vice President of Creative and Strategy at Guild Esports, effective immediately. He’s joined Guild on a permanent basis following a period providing creative consultancy.
Nick joins Guild from RYFX Media, where he worked with and delivered events and production for major sports and esports organisations. Prior to this he held senior content and creative executive roles, and positions at media companies including NBC, Universal, Sky UK and ITN.
Finally, Georgia Morison will assume the role of Head of Events and HQ at Guild Esports from February 6th 2023. Georgia has a background in events management, gained from her experience as Head of Premium Services at the O2 Arena in London for Levy UK and as Logistics Co-ordinator at brand experience agency Jack Morton Worldwide.
Georgia also has knowledge of the esports sector gained from her senior role at Gfinity, leading events for clients including the Formula One Esports Series, ePremier League, FUT Champions World Cup and Call of Duty World League.
The new appointees will report directly into CEO Jasmine Skee.
Guild Esports on why they’ve made the new appointments
In a press release, Guild said they believe the hires will allow Guild to ‘effectively implement growth plans for 2023, focusing on grassroots development, growing their fan and audience bases, and establishing the Sky Guild Gaming Centre as a premium events location for esports and corporate events’.
Jasmine Skee, CEO of Guild Esports, commented: “I’m delighted to welcome Luke and Georgia to Guild Esports and to congratulate Nick on his new position. With extensive sector experience, their appointments will enhance Guild’s operations and allow the company to scale up more effectively as it continues to expand.
“Their expertise will ensure we continue to build the Guild brand to become truly global through top tier esports teams and talent, creative campaigns and activations for both Guild and our partners, and supporting our vision to make the Sky Guild Gaming Centre the UK hub for esports, gaming and events.
“In addition, these hires will strengthen our offering to the potential sponsors that we are in high level discussions with, which is a priority moving into 2023.”
It’s been a busy few months for Guild. Last month, Subway and Guild Esports announced the Subway Future Talent Series, a project that aims to let school children in London experience esports, and Guild’s Fortnite player Anas won the MrBeast Fortnite Extreme Survival Challenge to claim the $1m first-place prize.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.