Blizzard's Headquarters building in Irvine, California
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Formerly called
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Subsidiary | |
Industry | Video games |
Founded | February 8, 1991 | (as Silicon & Synapse)
Founders |
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Headquarters | Irvine, California, United States |
Key people
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Michael Morhaime (President and CEO) |
Products |
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Revenue | US$ 1.1 billion (2015) |
US$ 223 million (2015) | |
Number of employees
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4,700 (As of 2012) |
Parent | Activision Blizzard |
Website | www |
Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. is an American video game developer and publisher based in Irvine, California, and is currently a subsidiary of American company Activision Blizzard. The company was founded on February 8, 1991, under the name Silicon & Synapse by three graduates of the University of California, Los Angeles:Michael Morhaime, Frank Pearce, and Allen Adham. The company originally concentrated primarily on the creation of game ports for other studios before beginning development of their own software in 1993 with the development of games like Rock n' Roll Racing and The Lost Vikings. In 1994 the company became Chaos Studios, then Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. after being acquired by distributor Davidson & Associates.
Shortly thereafter, Blizzard shipped out what would become their first breakthrough smash hit: Warcraft: Orcs & Humans. Blizzard then went on to create several other successful video games, including other Warcraft sequels, the Diablo series, the StarCraft series, and also in 2004 the popular MMORPG World of Warcraft. Their most recent projects include the first expansion for Diablo III (Reaper of Souls), the online collectible card game Hearthstone, the sixth expansion for World of Warcraft (Legion), the "Hero Brawler" Heroes of the Storm, the third and final expansion for StarCraft II (Legacy of the Void), and the multiplayer first-person shooter Overwatch.