Andy Wood
Andy founded USD who marketed and sold over 50 Number 1 games such as The Hobbit, Mortal Kombat, FIFA Soccer from publishers including Sony, Activision and Electronic Arts.
Founding committee member of the video games trade body UKIE Andy currently serves on UKIE's committee for Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality.
Co-founded the distribution company The Producers and the video games marketing agency Barrington Harvey. He was the Master of Ceremonies for 5 annual games industry award ceremonies and played an active part in the Help charity which raised over $4m through various video game compilations.
Chairman and co-founder of Mirage who developed and published HR Giger's Darkseed, Humans and the million selling Rise of the Robots featuring music from Brian May of Queen. Mirage were acquired by Atari.
Board Advisor to Europress; the market leader in education and lifestyle computer games.
Advised on the sale of Europress to Hasbro. Co-founded Actualize with the hit game series Rally Championship. Actualize acquired by Eidos.
Co-founded the venue Brereton Hall and the live venue Bar Cuba with members of The Smiths, New Order, Primal Scream and The Stone Roses.
Co-founded U-Vibe Records with a top 10 hit single and album by John Otway, and the double CD Cohesion for victims of war including tracks from Elbow, Ian Brown and Paul McCartney.
CEO of Image Metrics in 2004, then leaders in computer vision performance based facial animation, and the medical imaging company Optasia. Established Image Metrics' studios in Los Angeles and guided them to profitability. Image Metrics worked on many video games including Grand Theft Auto and feature films including Harry Potter and the Academy award winning The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons.
Appointed to the Board of Peter Gabriel's Real World and to the world music festival - WOMAD. He co-invented Gabble, the text to animation language with Peter Gabriel, and co-founded and the digital marketing agency Great Fridays. Great Fridays were acquired by EPAM.
Founder of Hypergallery; the online gallery for hand signed limited edition album cover prints.
Co-edited and wrote the foreword to the book ‘Out of the Blue’ - the photography of Oasis by Michael Spencer Jones.
Produced the animated video for Peter Gabriel's 'Book of Love'.
Co-founded the multi-award winning interactive music and video AppWholeWorldBand/YouDio - GodleyWood - with Kevin Godley (10cc, Godley & Creme). It features many musicians including members of the Rolling Stones and the Foo Fighters. It was utilised to promote Band Aid 30.
Andy is Chairman and a shareholder of the world leading realtime facial animation company Cubic Motion.
In 2016 Cubic Motion won the prestigious Siggraph Best Realtime Graphics & Interactivity Award.
Andy also occasionally plays double bass in a gypsy jazz trio.