Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
[Made at Sac State: Mark Otero]
>> Hi. I'm Mark Otero. I graduated from Sac State in 1999.
Spent most of my time Seoul, South Korea. It's a very different and very heavily dense
city. A lot of cars, a lot of traffic, a lot of smog, a lot of activity. We immigrated
here to Sacramento in '86.
I was interested in fantasy role-playing games like "Dungeons and Dragons." Snuck around
at night playing video games when I should have been sleeping [laughs].
My first business was a failed real estate company, then I started Mochii Yogurt, which
was a success on day one.
I sold my house, cashed out my 401K, moved in with my mom for a while and made a tremendous
amount of sacrifice to be bold. I figure you have one life, might as well give it everything.
I didn't want to have any regrets, so success didn't come easy -- and it shouldn't, so when
it does come, you can savor the moment.
[Clapping]
Going to Sac State was a rite of passage, really, for the beginning for the rest of
my life. For me to look back, going over 10 years, just how foundational my experience
was here.
Our games are played online, and they're played in three to four different languages. We have
customers in Australia, United Kingdom, Spain, France, Germany, South America and, of course,
throughout the U.S. So what that basically means is that our customer purchasing virtual
goods within our games, they're actually bringing money back to Sacramento. We are enriching
the neighborhood and the local region as a result of that.
We're looking at the global economy, and Sacramento is directly benefiting because of the nature
of the business that we have online through KlickNation.
I'm very happy we brought one of the world's largest video game companies here to Sacramento,
with KlickNation's acquisition. I can attribute a lot of the success, really, to the things
I learned here at Sac State.
[This is really neat!]
Part of the reason Electronic Arts invested in Sacramento is largely a function of several
things. One was: They wanted to see there were the education pillars necessary to help
build the type of company you need to build.
Going to Sac State was a lot about managing your time appropriately, and knowing what
to focus on, and spending most of your time focusing on. Also the practical guidance and
advice the professors shared -- once again, I think a large part of that was the small
class size, and the professors really cared about the students' education.
It was one of my mom's dreams that her children would go to college, so I was the first to
graduate with a bachelor's.
I'm Mark Otero. I was made at Sac State.