New startup Ohai has been getting big cocktail party buzz over the last few months. The company won’t disclose much about what they’re doing, except that they’re building a Flash-based massively multiplayer online game (MMOG). And they certainly have the team to do it.
Susan Wu, the founder and CEO, is a former principal at Charles River Ventures and the former CMO of the Apache Software Foundation, and has experience with MMOGs. She’s also a self-confessed World Of Warcraft addict. Her team includes Blake Commagere (CTO), a cofounder of Mogad (acquired by iSkoot); Don Neufeld (VP Engineering), the former technical director at Sony Online Entertainment where he shipped Everquest II, Planetside and 13 other products; and Scott Harsman (VP Production), the former executive producer and creative director at Sony Online Entertainment where he led development of Everquest II, Everquest and other projects.
Neufeld and Harsman both worked at Sony Online Entertainment and brought a team with them. Wu says via email “There are very few teams that have shipped multiple MMOs across different generations of products. We are very fortunate to have Scott, Don and the team they brought over from Sony. There is a significant amount of learning that comes from having gone through dozens of MMO launches that we are applying to our products. Also, while at Sony, our team was involved in the design and implementation of their virtual goods platform.”
The company won’t yet give details on what type of game or platform they’re building, but they’ve convinced the venture capitalists that the idea and technology is sound. In the Fall of 2008 the company raised an undisclosed round of financing with August Capital and Rustic Canyon Partners, rumored to be in the $6 million range.
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