★ GAMES ★ EDITEURS ★ MASTERTRONIC BUYS MELBOURNE HOUSE (POPULAR COMPUTING WEEKLY) ★ |
Mastertronic buys Melbourne House (Popular Computing Weekly) | Games Editeurs |
MELBOURNE House, publisher of The Hobbit and Way of the Exploding Fist, has been sold to budget pioneer Mastertronic. The sale gives Mastertronic its first full price software label, which will continue to be called Melbourne House, and will operate separately from Mastertronic's own software activities. Over £1 million Melbourne House (Publishers) has cost Mastertronic over £1 million, but the Australian side of the company, Beam Software (game development and programming) and SLM Australia (distribution) is not included in the sale, and will continue to be run by Alfred Milgrom and Naomi Besen, Melbourne House's founders. However, the Australian holding company for the group. Melbourne House PTY, will change its name -rights to the title 'Melbourne House' were included in the sale. Melbourne House staff are likely to move from their building in Hampton Wick, Surrey, to Mastertronic's offices in London, and some redundancies are inevitable. "Melbourne House will remain editorially autonomous. and in some degree their products will be competing with ours," said Frank Herman, director of Mastertronic. He confirmed that Mastertronic would continue to source software from Beam in Australia, to be published by Melbourne House. Herman is also considering the possibility of releasing some of Melbourne House's impressive back catalogue at reduced prices. "The back catalogue certainly has value, not necessarily at a new budget price, although I'd love to see a £ 1.99 Fist - there's a lot of life left in Fist" No books Mastertronic does not intend to take over the book publishing side of the company. For Melbourne House, director Alfred Milgrom stated, “Naomi and I will retain our full interest in Melbourne House Australia. We are simply selling the UK company, with which we will continue to have a close relationship.” He added. “This move will allow us to expand our licensing possibilities in the US and Japan." Popular Computing Weekly (87/2)
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