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French version : http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/alexis-bonte-sa-vie-son-jeu-son-interview--1914848/1/20

Summary :
- Who is Alexis Bonte ?
- Interview : Alexis Bonte is a geek
- The eRepublik’s genesis
- A sheep, Alexis Bonte, 14 questions, lots of answers


Who is Alexis Bonte ?
Most of you are totally ignoring who he is. Some of you who enter he’s name on eRepublik know he’s a player. Other who enters the name on Google has seen many website about Alexis Bonte. People who read these sites know he is the co-founder of eRepublik.
But for some old players he was also the first French Country President.


The first of many others failers

He is the co-founder but also the CEO of eRepublik Labs, he’s like a super-plato. And he’s French \o/

But why am I talking about him?
Because you was certainly angry against admins who are changing the game and you was thinking : who are these n00bs ?
So, Alexis Bonte is one of these n00bs.

Officialy Alexis Bonte is :

“Alexis Bonte (35) is the co-founder and CEO of eRepublik Labs. eRepublik Labs (one of the top 25 European start ups according to TechCrunch) is inventing game worlds and transforming the way they are created, distributed and played by leveraging the power of communities and the Web.
eRepublik.com its first massive online social strategy game, is set in a mirror version of the real world and launched in November 2007. eRepublik.com was a prize winner in the LeWeb3 start-up competition in 2007 as well as the TechCrunch FOWA competition in 2008 and was recognized by AlwayOn has one of the top 100 Private companies in the world in 2009. eRepublik was also a Webby Awards nominee in 2009 and 2010.
Prior to eRepublik, Alexis was with lastminute.com for 6 years right up to its 1b$ trade sale to Sabre in 2005.
Alexis is also the non-executive chairman of the video and music centred online community trilulilu.ro, the n’1 Romanian website. He is also a recognized speaker & panelist (CEBIT, La Red Innova, Games Gone Wild, Gamelab, Interactive Entertainment Summit, FICOD, GDC Europe etc.) and guest lecturer on Internet start ups and online games at several Universities. Alexis holds a BA Honours Degree in International Business & Languages from the European Business School (London), he is a sailing national champion (Portugal) and is fluent in 5 languages.”


Alexis Bonte, a traveler (smart traveler).

That’s the official description of Alexis Bonte, between CV and eRepublik advertise.


Interview : Alexis Bonte as you never seen him.

Alexis Bonte isen’t just an economic robot which are selling full supertankers of Gold, so here is an interview made by the CeBIT (http://www.cebit.de/en/about-the-trade-show/programme/cebit-global-conferences/alexis-bonte-erepublik-upclose).

Are there times when you go offline?
Its hard but fortunately it still happens, they still haven't made waterproof iPads so shower is offline time usually.

In what areas will the Internet change our lives (and work) the most over the next five years?
I see the Internet as the ultimate enabler of the service economy. It has revolutionized how we access share and use information and it will continue to further transform not only how we consume entertainment but also how we interact with it. Education and health will also see major positive changes from a better use of the power of the web in certain countries that 'get it'.

When did you write your last postcard?
Offline, when I was still a teenager, so that would be the late eighties /early nineties. I actually miss writing and getting postcards but I guess that is the same way I miss my CD collection and soon my library, the alternative is better.

What is your favorite social network?
Facebook for friends, linkedin for business

Which role would you like to play just once?
Tony Stark (Iron Man), he has nice toys it would be fun

What is your favorite website or Internet application?
itunes and amazon.com (kindle in particular) for shopping, twitter and Facebook for finding out what's happening.

What constitutes a successful day for you?
A day where I learned something new, sales where good and I managed to spend a bit of quality time with the ones I love.

How do you define creativity?
The ability to turn your ideas and dreams into a new and unique reality

What do you wish you had more time for?
My family, dreaming and doing stuff that would make me a better person

What was the last book you read?
Fall of Giants, Ken Follett's latest. I love historical fictions.



As Alexis Bonte, customize your expensive laptop with eRepublik’s stickers and be sure never someone will steal it.


Erepublik’s genesis

Alexis Bonte speaking about the eRepublik’s genesis and explain how a businessman become the CEO of an internet videogame. (http://www.alexisbonte.com/a-flashback-on-angel-investing-in-romania-and-my-first-investment-of-2011-tjobsro/)

In time I found 2 entrepreneurs with personalities, backgrounds and projects that I felt had real potential, but they were very different ones.

One, was George Lemnaru his project, eRepublik simply didn’t exist, it was just an idea we discussed whilst I was meeting him for something totally different (an online e-commerce website), everything needed to be done, we actually even changed the concept quite a lot in that first discussion and it needed to go international right away to have any chance of success.

This was not something I could simply invest a minority share in and advise from time to time. If the prototype phase demonstrated the potential, it was clearly a project that would need significant funds to grow. And demonstrate it did! Within 10 days of launching we had 10.000 players from 30 countries and our first hacking attacks and crisis.

The result is that having raised substantial funding on top of my initial investment from international external investors, eRepublik is by far the company where I am the most involved, holding the CEO role and I am really enjoying the ride so far. Focus on one company = practice what you are preaching; I owe it to the other investors who have placed their trust in us as well as to the greatly talented and dedicated team we now have.

eRepublik’s growth although not free of hick ups and major challenges: hacking attacks, team building trough trial and error, design errors… you name the crisis, we probably had it at one point or the other; has been great.

eRepubik now has over 2,2 million registered users from all over the world and growing (yes many are no longer active but that’s the measure all browser games give). It is a truly international company with offices in Dublin, Madrid and Bucharest and a team of 30 great people that have acquired considerable experience and know how and more importantly work great together. Less than 5% of eRepublik revenues come from Romania and we have sales in over 120 countries. As a part of this, it has been a challenging but rewarding experience to build from scratch with George Lemnaru an online games development studio in Bucharest. I’m looking forward to taking eRepublik to the next level now, leveraging what we have achieved so far.


How to show you are a geek even on golf course ? Alexis have the answer.


Questions, and answers

Here is the most important part of this article, 14 questions in nearly live, by mail, to Alexis Bonte.
Probably some questions you were wondering will have an answer, or not. (Translating from French)
(Specials thanks to Nya Muad Dib for his help to translate this interview, you rules (if you find mistakes, blame him))

Hello,

I allow myself to write this message to ask you some questions about your job on eRepublik.
First, I quickly introduce myself, Zbouby Zboub alias Dysh Moten on eRepublik, I am playing this game for about 1000 days. I've never been an important player but I use my experience to provide young players informations, advises and History of the game.

-Congratulations for your almost 1000 days !

Which make me write this mail, is the intrigue that always created to me the game administrator’s role and more precisely yours.
Conscious that chances to get an answer from you are low, I'll try to synthesize my questions.

- Not that low, no ?

1) You are officially co-founder and CEO of eRepublik. As the role of the CEO is purely administrative, do you have a role, an influence, directly on the game?

- Mostly administrative indeed, my influence on the game decreased as the game and the team grew. But I still interfere when it's necessary for the rest of the team or when people ask me to.

2) The communication between players and game administrators changed a lot during those 4 years.
The Insider and the official forum deletions, and also Plato communications by MP, which becomed irregular change administrators status evolved from "friends" to "powerfull Gods", communication seeming only possible from top to down.
Why this change ? Game development necessary implies to get a superiority position against players ?

- The communication is now done in a more personal manner, "one on one" with the ticketing system or PM. Moreover, PM are much more efficients and more read than the Insider that only a minority read and commented. So no there is not a superiority position, on the contrary there is a more personal and qualitative communication. We are at all players' service but it does not mean we can do exactly changes everybody wishes as it would be chaos.

3) During the 2011 Community Management Summit you made a conference about players rebellion against game administrators. eRepublik clearly brought its knowledge of the subject. What is your feeling in front of those "mutinies" that happened on the game ? Did you find them justify ? Do you think that the solutions you found to curtail them are sustainables ?

- Rising's mutiny was justified yes, we really made a mistake. The rectifications we brought did work, could we do better ? Yes of course, but we are on the good way. The other main mutiny was totally different, there was a minority of players that tried to impose its own vision did all to destroy the game when this vision has not been followed. It is not justifiable.

4) Which futur for eRepublik ? On which aspects of the game is the priority made on for the next months to come ?

-The game has good basis but we must improve the social component (the military units are a beginning), the user experience and concentrate ourselves on the players' number growth (+10% next month)

5) Don't the actual superiority of few eNations and the emphasis on the military module increase the risk to see a lost of interest of players for the game ?

- I don't think so, the powers' balance can change quickly in eRepublik, and the actions of one player can transform the new world, it gives a longer life that really few other games can reach.

6) How do you react in front of eRepublik's clones which arrive on internet ? Are they a threat ? Are they the result of players' deception ?

- "Copy is the best form of flattery". They are not a threat because they underestimate the difficulty to create and manage a game world as eRepublik. Moreover none works well.

7) You are at first a prosperous businessman on internet. Why did you launch yourself in the eRepublik's project which was completely different regarding what was usually done ? How living in Spain and managing businesses in Romania ?

- Simply because I was passionated by games like Civilization or Rome Total War and frustrated to improve my computer every time a new opus was released. I also thought internet would permit to create a game world more dynamic and interesting.

About Spain and Romania, by traveling a lot and having a team you trust.

8.) Since my arrival in the game in April 2009 (so after the beta period) I saw the gameplay changing a lot. From a complex economical module with specialities, profitability calculs according to wellness ect, we have entered in an extremely "low-fat" module, where everybody can become completely autonomous.

- We focused ourselves on what our analyse tools showed as most used modules and we tried to make the game more accessible while keeping depth where it's important. We did not always success but alsotogether, our stats show we did take more good decisions than bad ones.

9) How do you explain the big difference of players number regarding each countries on eRepublik ? What does explain that most populated countries in reality happen to be small countries in the game ?

- It is only due to the fact that is really players who create communities and thus a big part of a country's growth. A citizen can really change the destiny of a country.

[/b]10) The eKosovo recently did its entrance in the eWorld as a Serbia's province. What will be the others countries/regions to be implemented ? Will the development be focuse on Africa and more precisely in North Africa ? Or Middle East or Central America ? What are the criterias that count to add a country/region in the game ? [/b]

- The criterias are strategical interest and demanded ones in the game (traffic of the region). Other countries will be added but we do not know them at the moment.

11) Could you talk about the bot that buy products on the marketplace ?

- It's a balancing tool I do not know much more, it is a point of detail.

12) During many months now, eRepublik Labs posted a job offer about a Facebook game, where about is currently this project ? Is it possible to get some more informations about it ?

- We do not communicate on this point for the moment.

13) How many people work today on eRepublik ? What are their role ?

- About twenty on eRepublik.com (dev, design, moderators, project managers, marketing)

To end up, a question that annoys but must be asked.

14) The Gold's purchase is your only source of income for eRepublik. Is it possible to know which quantity of Golds is bought every day on eRepublik ? What are the most bought products ? And how manage this situation where there is on one side the profits' research, so encourage players to spend their money, and on another side avoid to make the most fortunated players master of the eWorld (which is finally a bit true) ?

- About 15% of players buy Gold, a lot among some that don't buy but play for a long time are also "masters of the world". It is not a question that annoys, a game like eRepublik couldn't survive with an advertisement model, (or they would be as poor that the large ammount of copies which were released and which had moslty disappear for want of ressources) we must make sure a balance is respected and that players who do not buy gold but contribute in another way can have fun too. As it is a fact for 85% of them and that a lot play for months even years, the balance shouldn't that bad.

Thanks to Alexis for taking the time to answer to all my questions, really honestly I did not think about getting an answer.
Alexis wished to see the article after publication, I give you the time to ask questions in comments, then he will do what he wants but he should see them.


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