John Carlsen
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
John Carlsen (born June 16, 1970 in Stanford, California) is an early computer game programmer and entrepreneur.
In the mid 1980s, Carlsen began his career in computer system and video game development in Sunnyvale, California, having early-career tenures with industry pioneers including:
- Atari: once the fastest-growing company in the history of American business
- Nolan Bushnell: Atari's founder and one of Silicon Valley's most prolific entrepreneurs
- Activision: the first third-party video game developer
After contributing to the design of Aapps MicroTV—the top product at the 1989 MacWorld Boston—and later witnessing the 1991 hostile takeover of Activision, Carlsen simultaneously enabled the rapid growth of two Silicon Valley startup companies: Media Vision—becoming the world's largest supplier of CD-quality PC sound cards (and second-largest supplier of PC sound cards overall), and Iguana Entertainment—becoming a major international developer of video games. In 1993, after his participation in Joint Venture:Silicon Valley, Carlsen helped relocate Iguana Entertainment to Austin, Texas, where it became the area's second-largest game developer (second to Origin Systems) before merging with Acclaim Entertainment, one of the world's largest video game publishers.
Having gained significant expertise in designing printed circuit boards using programmable logic devices, Carlsen turned his attention in the late 1990s toward the physical design and design automation of sub-micron integrated circuit semiconductors for Altera—a leading global supplier of programmable logic devices and one of Silicon Valley's first fabless semiconductor companies.
After making an unsuccessful bid for Apple Computer's top job in 1997, Carlsen returned to Austin and completed degrees in business management and computer science at St. Edward's University, adding to the five degrees he earned at De Anza College in Cupertino, California.
Following Acclaim Entertainment's 2004 bankruptcy, Carlsen founded Syncopated Systems (then as the Syncopated Software Development Corporation).
