The Academy of Interactive Entertainment Ltd (AIE), owner of the yearly Australian Game Developers Conference (AGDC) has announced that it will stop running its major Australasian conference event, held this year in Melbourne from December 2 to 4, in order to allow the Game Developers Association of Australia (GDAA) to build a brand new industry conference.
"The GDAA recently informed the AIE that it no longer wishes to support the AGDC and that it wishes to run its own industry conference" said Mr. John De Margheriti, Chairman of the AIE and founder of development studio Micro Fort?. "While this came as a surprise, we can understand the GDAA's desire to want to build a new conference largely modeled on what we have created, and have greater control of its destiny."
He continued: "While some have suggested for us to simply ignore the GDAA or sell the AGDC, this is not in the best interest of our industry. As the Founder of the GDAA, I feel that it's in the best interest of our local industry for the AIE to simply stop running the AGDC and to allow the GDAA the freedom of no competition so it can establish its own industry conference."
The GDAA has not yet announced any details on its plans for the event in 2006, although it has applauded a separate Australian regional government decision in which the Victorian authorities have announced plans to establish world class motion capture facilities in the State for game-related use, as well as the doubling of funds to help Australian game developers visit and exhibit at foreign trade shows.
Amazing, why would someone not want to do business with De Margheriti?!