"I arrived at Sega of America in February of 1999, and found we had nothing in place for the launch later that year," he says.
"We were coming off the Sega Saturn debacle, so the consumer was justifiably sceptical. We had to build a positioning, creative campaign, pricing and distribution strategy, even figure out whether to put the modem in the box or make it an add-on peripheral. The parent company was in dire financial straits, Electronic Arts had decided to not publish for the platform bless them ; and [US boss] Bernie Stolar left the company a month before launch. Oh yeah, and we had to figure out how to work multi-player games through a 56k modem.
"Somehow we pulled it all together for [the agreed date of] 9.9.99, and for the next year and a half gave everything we had to take on the PS2 juggernaut. Despite the blood, sweat and tears we all shed, on January 31st, 2001, I announced that we were getting out of the hardware business.
"I had to let half of the company go that day – the toughest day of my professional life. I still take pride on behalf of the team that I have yet to meet anyone who regretted buying a Dreamcast. I've still got mine
