YouTube head of gaming Ryan Wyatt to resign and join Polygon Studios as CEO

On Tuesday, Ryan Wyatt, head of gaming at YouTube, announced he would be leaving the video-sharing platform in February. Partly due to his leadership, YouTube Gaming sees over 250 million daily logged users per day with hundreds of billions of watch time each year. Wyatt cited his passion for blockchain and Web3 development in explaining his resignation. He will soon join Polygon Studios as its CEO.

Polygon Studios is the gaming and non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, arm of the namesake layer-two Ethereum scaling network. Polygon (MATIC) plans to commit $100 million to projects led by its subsidiary studio, which debuted last July. The firm’s objectives are to develop decentralized gaming, attract blockchain enthusiasts to its NFT tokens ecosystem and establish Polygon as a competent blockchain for the Web3 transition. Regarding his new role, Wyatt said:

“I will be focusing on growing the developer ecosystem through investment, marketing and developer support and bridging the gap between Web 2.0 and 3.0. I’ll be leading the Polygon Studios organization across gaming, entertainment, fashion, news, sports and more.”

It is bittersweet news to share that I am leaving @YouTube.

I have loved every minute of my time here, but it is time for my next endeavor.

I am elated to announce that I will be joining @0xPolygon ($MATIC) as their CEO of Polygon Studios.

Thank you for the memories! ❤️ pic.twitter.com/VhQxpqDbFO

— Ryan Wyatt (fwiz.eth) (@Fwiz) January 25, 2022

In his departure statement, Wyatt described fond memories of his first day at Google’s Mountain View, California headquarters in 2014. He also expressed his gratitude to CEO Susan Wojcicki and chief business officer Robert Kyncl for hiring him eight years back. Meanwhile, Polygon Studios gave Wyatt a warm welcome to his new role.

Please welcome our new CEO to Polygon Studios

Welcome @Fwiz to the PS family!

Ryan is the former Head of Gaming @YouTube and we are all looking forward to working with him https://t.co/NQgLqUBLPi

— Polygon Studios (@_PolygonStudios) January 25, 2022