Previous GameStop Management ‘Failed to Adapt’ to Gaming’s Future: CEO

GameStop invested in a “dedicated blockchain team” during its fiscal year ended Jan. 29, and is on pace to launch its nonfungible tokens marketplace by the late-July end of its fiscal Q2, said CEO Matt Furlong on a Q4 earnings call Thursday. “We are going to continue taking steps to create new offerings and make targeted bets in blockchain gaming and cryptocurrency,” said Furlong, who joined GameStop as CEO in June after a nine-year career at Amazon. “We have learned from the mistakes of the past decade when GameStop failed to adapt to the future of gaming.” GameStop had a string of interim CEOs after Paul Raines left for medical reasons in November 2017. GameStop was so “capital-starved” when Furlong arrived “that we have had to rebuild it from within,” he said. “We’ve also had to change the way we assess revenue opportunities by starting to embrace, rather than run from, the new frontiers of gaming. Although there is a lot more hard work and necessary execution in front of us, GameStop is a completely different company today than it was at the beginning of the fiscal year.”