Kellee Santiago
Independent
Kellee Santiago, as president and co-founder of thatgamecompany over the last six years, has developed one of the most prominent brands in independent and innovative game development, pushing the communicative possibilities of video games as a medium. She is currently a partner in IndieFund, which aims to support the growth of games as a medium by helping indie developers get, and stay, financially independent.
Kellee graduated with an MFA from the Interactive Media program at the University of Southern California, School of Cinematic Arts, where she teamed up with fellow student Jenova Chen on the student-created game, Cloud. The game went on to become critically acclaimed and landed the two a three-game deal with Sony Computer Entertainment America, Inc. to develop downloadable games for the PlayStation Network. The three titles, flOw, Flower, and most recently, Journey, were each record-breaking commercial successes and award-winning titles.
Kellee speaks around the world at video game, business, and entertainment conferences on innovation in games, entrepreneurship, games as art, and better methods for video game development. In 2010 she became a TEDFellow, and was recognized as one of The Ten Most Influential Women in Games of the Past Decade. Kellee has also received the 2011 Microsoft Top Women in Gaming award for Business.