Atomhawk gains TIGA STAR Award for Excellence

LONDON, Oct. 14, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The multi-award wining art and design studio Atomhawk has received the prestigious TIGA STAR Award. The TIGA STAR award scheme recognises the very best employers, both small and large, in the UK video games industry.

The TIGA STAR system was developed to benchmark the way companies of all sizes are run in order to encourage best practice, with a particular focus on the way staff contribute to success. The TIGA STAR system examines a games business in four areas: Strategy, Teams, Advancement and Recognition.

Atomhawk is renowned for bringing ideas to life for movies, games and product design through world class visual development and design. The studio  passed all four of the TIGA STAR themes with flying colours:

• Strategy: how the organisation develops and adheres to a clear vision, strategy and demonstrates effective leadership.
• Teams: how the organisation recruits and retains great teams; promotes training, diversity and equal opportunities; and facilitates flexible working, etc.
• Advancement: how the organisation continually makes advances in its business operations.
• Recognition: how the organisation recognises and rewards individuals, teams and organisational success.

TIGA's evaluation of Atomhawk demonstrated that the company is a great place to work and has a clear vision for enduring success. The TIGA assessment team noted numerous examples of good practice at Atomhawk, including the following:

• A clear mission and four drivers to guide the business's strategy, growth and decision making.
• A 'no-crunch' culture and the promotion of equality of opportunity, with 35 per cent of senior positions held by women.
• Sharing of knowledge and information via online platforms and informal activities.
• Recognition of excellent work internally, regular annual pay rises and bonuses linked to company performance.

Atomhawk, part of the Sumo Group of companies, has enjoyed considerable growth in recent years, doubling the size of its studio team between 2016 and 2021 and tripling turnover within the same period.

Dr Richard Wilson OBE, TIGA CEO, said:

"The TIGA STAR System recogises excellent businesses and promotes best practice in the video games industry and Atomhawk has achieved the TIGA STAR with flying colours. The practises in place around information sharing, support of staff and recognising individual and team efforts in particular are exemplary.  Congratulations to Atomhawk Design on achieving the TIGA STAR."

Tim Wilson, Managing Director Atomhawk, said:

"We're thrilled to have been awarded the prestigious TIGA STAR. The team put a lot of effort into making the studio a great place to work so it's lovely to be formally recognised for this. We aim to provide our team with an environment where they can create great work in a sustainable way. Over the years Atomhawk has invested significantly in ways to support, reward and develop the team and we'll continue to do so in the future."

Ben Hayes, TIGA STAR lead assessor, said:

"Atomhawk employ the best people in their field and they realise that to recruit and retain such talent the company needs to be up there with the best in their field in how they lead, develop, take care of, motivate and involve the people they have.  They have long grasped that getting that side of the equation right is not a 'nice to have' but business critical.  At Atomhawk they are doing all these thing really well."

For more information on the TIGA STAR scheme and our TIGA STAR companies, see: https://tiga.org/star

About TIGA:

TIGA is the trade association for the UK video games industry.  Our vision is to make the UK the best place in the world to develop video games. Our core purpose is to strengthen the games development and digital publishing sector. To this end, we focus on four strategic objectives:

• influencing Government policy via effective political representation;
• raising the profile of our industry to influence public policy;
• enhancing education and skills through our accreditation programme (https://tiga.org/education/tiga-university-accreditation) and the TIGA Games Education Awards (https://tiga.org/education-awards); and
• promoting best practice through our membership services, including the TIGA STAR Employer Award (https://tiga.org/star), the TIGA Games Industry Awards (https://tiga.org/awards) and exclusive events for TIGA members.

For more information contact TIGA:

Tel: 0845 468 2330
Email: info@tiga.org 
Web: www.tiga.org
Twitter: www.twitter.com/tigamovement
Facebook: www.facebook.com/TIGAMovement
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/company/tiga 

About Sumo Group – www.sumogroupplc.com 

Sumo Group's businesses provide acclaimed development, design and publishing services to the video games and entertainment industries from studios in the UK, India, Canada, the US, and Poland.

Sumo Digital, as the Group's primary business, is one of the UK's largest independent developers of AAA-rated video games, having studios in Sheffield, Newcastle, Nottingham, Leamington Spa, Warrington and Pune, India. The business has acquired three studios since IPO, which operate under their own names, BAFTA award-winning The Chinese Room in Brighton, Red Kite Games in Leeds, Lab42 in Leamington Spa and PixelAnt Games in Wroclaw, Poland. Sumo Digital provides turnkey and co-development solutions to a global blue-chip client base.

Pipeworks is an innovative, well-established, and respected US video games developer based in Eugene, Oregon. It provides full development, co-development, and live operations to premier video game publishers and other partners.

Atomhawk is a multi-award-winning visual design company, with studios in Newcastle and in Vancouver (Canada), servicing the games, film, and visual effects industries.

Secret Mode is a video games publisher, focused on delivering fresh and new gaming experiences to players and building expansive and fulfilling communities around those games. It will publish titles developed within Sumo Group and also by independent developers.

Auroch Digital is a Bristol-based videogame developer and publisher with a focus on original IP creation.

SOURCE TIGA