Thor Fridriksson
Born
Þorsteinn Baldur Friðriksson

(1979-06-30) June 30, 1979
Reykjavík, Iceland
NationalityIcelandic
Alma materUniversity of Oxford (MBA, 2009)
Known forPlain Vanilla Games

Þorsteinn Baldur Friðriksson[1] (born 30 June 1979), commonly anglicised as Thor Fridriksson, is an Icelandic businessman. He was the founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of Plain Vanilla Games, a Reykjavík-based video game developer, until its defunction in August 2016.[2]

Personal life

Thor was born in Reykjavík on 30 June 1979. He graduated from the Menntaskólinn í Reykjavík in 1999 and studied at Reykjavik University.[3][4]

Career

Thor was working with the broadband-ISP startup Hive until it was purchased by Vodafone in 2007.[5] Deciding to explore a different industry, Thor became a local TV news reporter.[2][5] After studying at the University of Oxford, Thor started Plain Vanilla Games in Reykjavík during the Icelandic financial crisis.[6] Thor and his team at Plain Vanilla Games spent over a year developing an educational app for children called The Moogies,[5] that failed to gain popularity on the App Store.[7] Despite the country's economic issues, Thor decided to keep the Plain Vanilla Games' headquarters located in Reykjavík to help support job growth and other start-up companies.[6]

In June 2020, Thor released a new game titled Trivia Royale that "lets users compete in a 1,000-person, single-elimination trivia tournament."[8]

In 2022, Thor launched a new gaming platform, Rocky Road, which debuted a "hyperlocal social mobile gaming experience" in Iceland, and subsequently raised $5.2 million from Luminar Ventures, Crowberry Capital, Sisu Ventures and David Helgason, the founder of Unity Technologies.[9]

References

  1. ↑ Bogadóttir, Þórunn Elísabet (31 August 2016). "Plain Vanilla lokað á Íslandi – öllum starfsmönnum sagt upp". Kjarninn. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
  2. 1 2 Kolodny, Lora (27 December 2013). "QuizUp Takes Over Where Trivial Pursuit Left Off — The Mobile Generation". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
  3. ↑ "Metnaður til að skara fram úr" [Ambition to excel]. Morgunblaðið (in Icelandic). 2 May 2003. Retrieved 22 October 2022.
  4. ↑ Griffith, Erin (6 March 2014). "How hit trivia app QuizUp survived the hype cycle". Fortune. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
  5. 1 2 3 Lumb, David (28 February 2014). "How The Creator Of QuizUp Turned A String Of Foolish Moves Into A 10 Million-User App". Fast Company. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
  6. 1 2 Gottlieb, Jenna (6 March 2014). "Startup's success with QuizUp app a bright spot for Iceland's economy". The Seattle Times. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
  7. ↑ Roof, Katie (6 March 2014). "QuizUp Debuts On Android; How An Icelandic Game Became An Overnight Success". Forbes. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
  8. ↑ "How Thor Fridriksson's 'Trivia Royale' earned 2.5M downloads in 3 weeks". TechCrunch. Retrieved 12 July 2020.
  9. ↑ "Icelandic startup secures $3M seed for innovative social mobile gaming experience". Arctic Startups.


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