Full Conference Programme Now Live; Early Bird tickets on sale until 6 June.

Jade Raymond, Group General Manager for Electronic Arts’ PopCap Vancouver and Motive Studios, has been announced today as the latest keynote speaker for this year’s Develop:Brighton conference and expo at the Hilton Brighton Metropole in July. Jade will also be awarded the inaugural Develop Vanguard Award at the Develop Awards organised by Future Publishing on Wednesday evening.

Famed for her role in the creation of Ubisoft’s enormously successful Assassin’s Creed and Watch Dogs franchises, Jade Raymond also founded Ubisoft’s Toronto studio, which developed blockbuster titles like Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Blacklist under her direction. In 2015 she formed Motive Studios with Electronic Arts, where she’s currently developing original new IP. Jade also oversees PopCap Vancouver and is responsible for the HD Star Wars portfolio across EA.

During her keynote titled Industry Vanguard Jade Raymond Talks About Her Past and A Galaxy Far, Far Away, Jade will talk about her career, which began as a programmer for Sony, her journey so far as a developer and her views on the future for her and the industry.

Jade Raymond is the third keynote speaker to be announced for Develop:Brighton and will deliver her keynote on Wednesday 11th July. Sony Interactive Entertainment’s Shuhei Yoshida will deliver the opening keynote on Tuesday 10th July and Bossa Studios’ Chet Faliszek completes the line-up and will deliver his keynote on Thursday 12th July.

“It is with great pleasure we announce Jade Raymond as our day two keynote,” commented Andy Lane, managing director of Develop:Brighton organisers, Tandem Events. “Jade is one of the most respected developers in today’s global market. She has worked for some of the biggest companies in the industry, creating some of the most successful franchises and her keynote will be a unique opportunity for Develop:Brighton delegates to learn and gain insights from an industry legend.”

Seth Barton, editor of MCV and organiser of the Develop Awards added, “This year the Develop Awards will present its inaugural Vanguard Award. The criteria were for someone who has ‘blazed a trail in games development that will inspire others to follow them’. All of which perfectly describes industry star Jade Raymond – and no, we didn’t write the description just for her, but we really could of. Jade Raymond needs no introduction as one of the most visible and exciting faces in games development today. Having made her mark at Ubisoft on Assassin’s Creed, she now leads EA’s Motive Studios, working on an unannounced Star Wars title. We’re incredibly excited to be honouring Raymond at the awards this year.”

Develop:Brighton, Europe’s leading game developer conference and expo, will consist of eight tracks: Design; Art; Audio; Business; Coding; Evolve; Indie and Discoverability across a new three day format with the expo open on Wednesday and Thursday. The full conference programme is now live and can be viewed on the website here: https://www.developconference.com/whats-on/conference-new

Other sessions already announced include:

• [KEYNOTE] Fireside Chat with the President of PlayStation’s Worldwide Studios Shuhei Yoshida, Sony Interactive Entertainment
• [KEYNOTE] The Future of AI in Games Creation Chet Faliszek, Bossa Studios [BUSINESS] Five Stars – The Best Video Games of 2018 (so far) Jordan Erica Webber, Games Journalist
• [BUSINESS] Cryptocurrency in Gaming: Today and Tomorrow Alex Amsel, Fig [DISCOVERABILITY] Community Management in the Memeverse Grace Carroll, Creative Assembly
• [DISCOVERABILITY] Your Game Isn’t Going to Sell. Let’s See What We Can Do About That Mike Rose, No More Robots
• [EVOLVE] Artificial Stupidity to Killer Robots: The Evolution of AI Ian Shaw, Games Technology Consulting
• [EVOLVE] VR and Disability: An Overdue Love Story Paolo Torelli, Programmer and UX Expert
• [INDIE] Do Switch Quick, Get Rich Quick? Tony Gowland, Ant Workshop
• [INDIE] What To Do When That One Big Deal, Doesn’t Turn Into The Next Big Deal Aj Grand Scrutton, Dlala Studios
• [CODING] AI In Your Pocket: Character-Based Conversational Sims Mitu Khandaker, Spirit AI
• [CODING] Enhancing Your Game’s AI Using Unity Machine Learning Agents Alessia Nigretti, Unity Technologies
• [DESIGN] Design Workshop: Advanced Paper Prototyping Dr. Mata Haggis-Burridge, NHTV
• [DESIGN] Leveraging Culturalisation for Building Better Game Worlds Kate Edwards, Geogrify
• [AUDIO] Challenging Videogame Music Troops Olivier Deriviere & James Hannigan, Composers
• [AUDIO] Horizon Zero Dawn – Dealing with Scope and Scale in a Brand New Open World Bastian Seelbach, Guerrilla Games
• [ART] Solving an Invisible Problem: Designing for Colour-Blindness Douglas Pennant, Creative Assembly
• [ART] Physically Based Workflows Explained Claudia Doppioslash, Contafoe

Registration is live for Develop:Brighton, with Early Bird tickets on sale until 6 June at www.developconference.com.
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Note to editors:
Ravi Vijh or Dean Barrett Bastion +44 (0)20 3841 7660 ravi@bastion.co.uk/dean@bastion.co.uk About Develop:Brighton conference & expo

The Develop:Brighton conference is where the European developer community comes together to learn from each other and share experiences, be inspired by world renowned experts and gurus, get up-to-date with the latest development tools and techniques, make new contacts and catch up with old ones. With a programme that is shaped by some of the industry's key figures, the conference touches all levels of the development community from the largest studios to the smallest indies; from development directors to programmers. Twitter @developconf Facebook /developconference