George L. Rose

George Rose (born 1961) served as Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Chief Public Policy Officer of
Activision Blizzard.
Early career
After graduating from University of Michigan in 1983 with a Bachelor Degree in Business Administration,
Rose became one of the first immigrants from the former Soviet Union to attend Harvard Law School, where he
earned a Juris Doctor degree in 1986.
Rose started his career as a corporate entertainment attorney for Los Angeles firm Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, LLP. After three years, he moved to a firm now known as Glaser, Weil, LLP. where he worked on a variety of deals for MGM/UA Home Entertainment Group, MGM Grand Inc., and other entities owned by billionaire Kirk Kerkorian in addition to other corporate entertainment transactions such Sony’s purchase of Columbia Pictures and construction of the
Stratosphere Las Vegas entertainment complex.
With the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, Rose and several friends founded Korbatov, Rose &
Rubinstein, a law firm dedicated to transactions in the republics of the former Soviet Union. In 1995, after a brief stint at Katten, Muchin & Zaviz, Rose became one of the first legal department employees of Activision, which at that time had just emerged from bankruptcy. Since joining Activision, Rose became known as a veteran of the video game industry, responsible for many of its legal and business rules and conventions.
Work with Activision Blizzard
Since joining Activision, Rose has held various positions within business and legal affairs such as General Counsel, and later, Chief Legal Officer. In these roles, Rose was responsible for overseeing all aspects of the company’s legal strategy, including: acquisitions of more than a dozen studios; signing key licenses with Marvel Enterprises, DreamWorks Animation SKG and Tony Hawk; and development of properties such as Call of Duty and Guitar Hero. Following Activision’s merger with Vivendi Games in 2008, Rose became Chief Legal Officer of the combined company, Activision Blizzard. In November 2009, Rose was appointed Executive Vice President and Chief Public Policy Officer of Activision Blizzard, where he was responsible for setting the course of the company’s government outreach and legislative efforts worldwide.
Activision Blizzard paid Rose an annual salary of $541,451, his total remuneration for 2010 was $3,682,450.
According to Activision's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Rose retired from his active duties in September 2011 to pursue personal projects and interests but remained consultant to Activision's CEO, Robert Kotick, with whom he worked since he joined the company.
Opposition to Schwarzenegger vs. EMA
In his role as Activision's Chief Public Policy Officer, Rose launched an outspoken lobbying effort against a California law enacted in 2005 that was intended to ban the sale of certain violent video games to children without parental supervision. and would have created an exception to the First Amendment by banning the sale of certain violent videogames to minors. The 2005 law was the subject of the then pending U.S. Supreme Court case Schwarzenegger v. Entertainment Merchants Association.
The Entertainment Software Association, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Civil Liberties Union were among the many organizations urging the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down this law.
Rose has long been a vocal advocate for the First Amendment rights of the video game industry, supporting efforts by the Entertainment Software Association to oppose and enjoin as unconstitutional similar video game legislation in over a dozen states from Michigan to Louisiana. To date, such laws have been deemed unconstitutional by every court that has considered them.
In lieu of the proposed legislation, Rose and Activision are in support of the voluntary ratings system currently in place through the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB), a non-profit, self-regulating body that independently assigns ratings, enforces advertising guidelines, and helps ensure responsible online privacy practices for the interactive entertainment software industry. In advocating for this ESRB Rose has said, “the industry's ratings partnership has been thoroughly tested and praised by the Federal Trade Commission as thorough and effective." San Jose Mercury News, Los Angeles Times and San Francisco Chronicle, Rose has argued that ESRB is more effective and efficient in preventing the sale of violent games to minors and in helping parents make informed decisions about the age appropriateness of games for their children than a “taxpayer-funded bureaucracy the state can't afford.”
Rose's views were vindicated when in Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association (formerly titled as Schwarzenegger v. Entertainment Merchants Association) United States Supreme Court struck down the 2005 California law. In a 7-2 decision, the Court upheld the lower court decisions and nullified the law, ruling that video games were protected speech under the First Amendment as other forms of media.</ref>
Charitable work
In 2011, Rose started The Rose Family Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to exploring use of video games and interactive products in education, medicine and social life. As one of his first projects, the Foundation sponsored in September 2011 the first ever symposium on the use of video games in diagnosis and treatment of various mental disorders. The symposium held in San Francisco on the campus of University of California was known as Entertainment Software and Cognitive Neurotherapeutics Society (ESCoNS) and successfully brought together over 200 interested scientists, members of the interactive industry, government and other interested parties. Next meeting of ESCoNS took place March 13-15, 2013 at The University of Southern Caliofrnia in Los Angeles. The meeting again attracted hundreds of pioneers in sciencntific, educational and industrial communities, that gathered to discuss topics ranging from brain placticity to virtual reality. In addition to The Foundation, the second gathering of ESCoNS was supported, among other parties, by National Institute of Health, The Robert Woods Johnson Foundation, International Mental Health Research Organization (IMHRO) and The University of Souther California School of Cinematic Arts. The next meeting of ESCoNS is now in the planning stages for May 2015.
The Foundation also actively supported with financial assistance and lobbied the industry for support for the exhibit at The Smithsonian Museum known as The Art of Video Games. Held at Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington DC during March 16, 2012 to September 30, 2012, this exhibit traced the evolution of video games as an artistic medium and reinforces in the most positive manner the place video games now hold in the American art and culture. Following its conclusion in Washington the Exhibit went on tour at ten other venues across the United States between 2013 and 2016.
*Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. (March 16, 2012 - September 30, 2012)
*Boca Raton Museum of Art in Boca Raton, Florida (October 24, 2012 - January 13, 2013)
*EMP Museum in Seattle, Washington (February 16, 2013 - May 13, 2013)
*Phoenix Art Museum in Phoenix, Arizona (June 16, 2013—September 29, 2013)
*Everson Museum of Art in Syracuse, New York (October 25, 2013 - January 19, 2014)
*Hudson River Museum in Yonkers, New York (February 15, 2014 - May 18, 2014)
*Toledo Museum of Art in Toledo, Ohio (June 19, 2014 - September 28, 2014)
*Flint Institute of Arts in Flint, Michigan (October 25, 2014 - January 18, 2015)
*Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia (February 13, 2015 - May 10, 2015)
*Memphis Brooks Museum of Art in Memphis, Tennessee (June 6, 2015 - September 13, 2015)
*The Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum at Florida International University in Miami, Florida (October 9, 2015 - January 25, 2016)
The Foundation is also a proud supporter of Web Wise Kids, a non profit organization devoted to education of children in the safe use of the Internet using video games as the medium of exchange.
Currently the Foundation is in its third year of granting Fellowships at the University of Southern California School of Interactive Media for students who are interested in pursuing projects in the alternative use of video games directed to medical uses, education and social causes.
Personal life and Business Activities

After his retirement and until December 31, 2012, Rose served as an advisor to Activision's CEO Robert Kotick and a Chairman of Activision's Call of Duty Endowment, an organization dedicated to finding employment for combat veterans returning from active duty. Rose also founded and is actively involved in The Rose Family Foundation, a charitable organization dedicated to advancement of alternative uses of video game technology for science, education and medicine.

In 2012, Rose started Suffolk Ventures, LLC, a seed to early stage financing and mentoring company/fund directed to star up enterprises using technologies in medicine and education. Among Rose's notable endeavors are:

Fingerprint, a company based in San Francisco that is the first kids' learning and entertainment platform, providing sharing and engagement opportunities between kids and grown ups across mobile devices and the web. Its network of quality edutainment apps is made up of first-party apps, as well as apps "fingerprinted" by third-party developers.

E-Line Media, a publisher of game-based learning products and services that engage, educate and empower, helping to prepare youth for lives and careers in the 21st century. E-Line works with leading foundations, academics, nonprofits and government agencies to harness the power of games for learning, health and social impact. In 2014 ELine and video game developer Upper One Games in conjunction with the Cook Inlet Tribal Council,

Akili Interactive Labs is developing the first therapeutic mobile video games. The widespread emergence of mobile technology has enabled this novel treatment modality, which represents an entirely new class of therapeutics. Akili’s hallmark is to combine cutting-edge neuroscience insights, rigorous clinical validation and state-of-the-art game mechanics. The result is highly-effective and highly-engaging products, built and validated for specific patient groups. Akili was co-founded by PureTech Ventures, (a technology development company tackling tomorrow’s biggest healthcare challenges), leading cognitive neuroscientists, and top-tier entertainment game designers - creating a team with high attention to detail with regard to both science and engagement. Akili's current main product is an ADHD treatment software. Scott Kirsner of the Boston Globe wrote of Akili that, "Akili is pretty different from the typical PureTech project: the start-up has brought on board veterans of Lucas Digital Arts and Electronic Arts who have worked on games like Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and Medal of Honor.". Rose was introduced tto Akili by Professor Adam Gazzaley, founder of Gazzaley Labs at UCSF and his colleague on the Board of Directors of ESCoNS.

Rose was one of the early investment supporters and advisor to Oculus VR, a virtual reality technology company founded by Brendan Iribe and Palmer Luckey. Their first product, still in development, is the Oculus Rift, a head-mounted display for immersive virtual reality (VR). In March 2014, Facebook agreed to acquire Oculus VR for US$2 billion in cash and Facebook stock.<ref name="Cosimple" />

In 2014, Rose joined as a mentor and investor 'Amplify.la', a hands-on startup accelerator and entrepreneurial campus in Venice, California, famed Silicon Beach. Located in the heart of Los Angeles, Amplify is perfectly positioned—physically and programmatically—to help our companies thrive. Amplify has an unmatched team of investors, mentors and executives who are committed to helping our founders build their startups into strong, scalable, successful companies. Rose continues to mentor companies incubating through the Amplify.la system.

Rose lives in Los Angeles, California with his wife and two sons

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu