Hilmar Veigar Pétursson

Hilmar has been leading CCP Games’ ongoing success and growth since his appointment as Chief Executive Officer in 2004.

Under Hilmar’s management CCP’s critically acclaimed science fiction game EVE Online pioneered concepts like player-driven digital economies, democratically elected community governments, and free-to-play mechanics long before they became commonplace in the industry. EVE Online, as the largest living work of science fiction, has been celebrating almost 20 consecutive years of continuous growth in subscriber engagement with no sign of slowing down.

Moreover, Hilmar put CCP into the pole position of VR revolution by embracing the new technology early and releasing spearheading VR games such as arcade shooter Gunjack, its sequel Gunjack 2,EVE: Valkyrie, a dogfighting shooter, as well as Sparc, a ground breaking full-body virtual sport.

In 2018, Hilmar successfully closed a deal to partner with Black Desert Online developer Pearl Abyss in order to realise CCP’s future-facing changes in strategy and structure.

Hilmar has been a featured speaker at dozens of conferences and events, including Casual Connect, Slush, and DICE. His fields of expertise especially include Blockchain and what it can teach peers inside and outside the industry about the future of gaming and gaming economies.

Before his appointment to the CEO position, Hilmar held the title of CCP's Chief Technical Officer, heading the engineering effort required to create the company’s persistent virtual world technology and 3D engine.

Prior to joining CCP in 2000, he served as the CTO of SmartVR, an OZ.com spin-off based on that company’s multi-user virtual reality technology following his tenure as the VP of software development for the OZ Studios division of OZ.com. Currently, he is also active on several boards and committees relating to Icelandic information technology and innovation. Hilmar has a B.Sc. in Computer Science from the University of Iceland.