Dylan Collins (born 1980) is an Irish software company founder and technology investor.
Collins was a co-founder in 2003 of the Actor gaming software start-up
Demonware
Demonware, Inc. is an Irish software development company and a subsidiary of Activision, a video game division of Activision Blizzard. Demonware's products enable games publishers to outsource their networking requirements, allowing them to con ...
,
which was sold to
Activision
Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one ...
in 2007.
In 2007, Collins went on to found Jolt Online which was sold to
GameStop in 2009.
In 2013, Collins founded SuperAwesome, a company that builds infrastructure to manage and use the data of children on the internet, where he remains as CEO. The company raised a $7 million investment in June 2015
and in 2017 it was reported by
Sky News that the company had raised an additional £20m. The company powers the parental consent requirement for many games oriented at kids such as
Pokémon Go
''Pokémon Go'' (stylized as ''Pokémon GO'') is a 2016 augmented reality (AR) mobile game, part of the ''Pokémon'' franchise, developed and published by Niantic in collaboration with Nintendo and The Pokémon Company for iOS and Android ...
. Microsoft's investment arm
M12 invested in the company in 2019 and it was acquired in 2020 by
Epic Games for an undisclosed amount.
Collins is regularly quoted in the media around the application of
Children's Online Privacy Protection Act
The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA) is a United States federal law, located at ().
The act, effective April 21, 2000, applies to the online collection of personal information by persons or entities under U.S. juri ...
(COPPA) to technology companies and the general concern of parental consent required for games and applications that target children. He has recommended media companies have a "Chief Children's Officer" to safeguard the privacy and concerns of children.
Collins is a graduate of
Trinity College, Dublin, and he sits on the board of Irish television animation studio
Brown Bag Films.
References
Alumni of Trinity College Dublin
Living people
Irish businesspeople
1980 births
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