Microsoft Hires EA Executive to Run Xbox Live

John Schappert will head Xbox Live, one of the best performing parts of the Xbox business.

Microsoft Corp. has hired another Electronic Arts Inc. executive in an effort to help support a surprisingly successful part of the Xbox group.

John Schappert, who was executive vice president at EA, will fill a new position at Microsoft as corporate vice president of Live, software and services in the Microsoft Interactive Entertainment Business. He'll oversee activities related to Xbox Live, the service that lets subscribers play games against each other online and buy content such as TV shows and arcade games.

Schappert will focus on expanding Live's online services and broadening the audience using it, Microsoft said in a statement. Live users can also do video, voice and text chat with each other.

Xbox Live is one of the best performing parts of the Xbox business, gaining subscribers faster than Microsoft expected and earning more money than the company anticipated, said Matt Rosoff, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft.

The service has more than 7 million users and has had 220 million downloads of content, including 45 million paid arcade games, Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft's entertainment and devices business, said at a recent meeting with financial analysts.

The Xbox Live video marketplace has been a "pleasant surprise" for Microsoft, he said. Strong subscriber growth is expected to continue, he said.

Schappert's move follows other recent executive exchanges between EA and Microsoft. Last month Peter Moore, formerly the head of Microsoft's Xbox and Windows gaming initiatives, joined EA as president of EA Sports. Don Mattrick, a former president at EA, took his place at Microsoft. Schappert will report to Mattrick.

Moore left the company shortly after Microsoft acknowledged that some Xbox 360 consoles have a hardware problem. Microsoft took a more than US$1 billion charge related to fixing and replacing the consoles.

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