Outspark's Chief Operating Officer Yun Promoted To CEO

Free-to-play MMO company Outspark (Divine Souls, 7 Dragons) has announced that its chief operating officer, Philip Yun, will take the reins of the company as CEO to replace departing founder Susan Choe, reports VentureBeat. Yun joined Outspark last March, and previously spent two years as CEO of NHN USA, where he had worked in other positions since 2004. The company has gone through multiple rounds of funding since 2007, with the most recent public round being in 2009, when the firm picked up $8.3 million in total. It has both operated Asian MMOs in the West and acted as a publishing partner for other online games. In 2010, former executive Choe appointed former EA executive Owen Mahoney as Outspark's CEO, while she remained with the company as chairman of the Board. Mahoney left Outspark a few months later to join Korean online game publisher Nexon, and Choe once again resumed her role as CEO. Last month, Outspark launched Flint, a new digital distribution platform for developers to publish and operate MMO free-to-play titles.