U of L grad and business partner making big splash in ‘new media’
August 28, 2007 - The following article was featured in the August 9th edition of the Lethbridge Herald. Thanks to the Herald's Dave Mabell for writing the article.
Want to learn about dinosaurs? Street safety?
Information on those and many other topics is the focus of new interactive games being designed by a University of Lethbridge graduate. But now Jason Suriano and his business partner [Ken Bautista] are getting into the big leagues of "new media" across North America.
Now based in Edmonton, Suriano is president and chief operating officer of Hotroket and its production company Rocketfuel. It's become one of just four Canadian companies represented by FOG Studios, a new media agency that's played a role in marketing such runaway successes as King's Quest, Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
"FOG connects us to worldwide network of developers, publishers and agencies," he says.
The Philadelphia-based company will help Hotrocket develop new "multi-platform interactive entertainment concepts" through its links with other studios and clients, Suriano explains.
"We've been working to refine our creative process and business strategy over the last few years," he says. "This relationship with FOG helps us to execute that process and strategy more quickly and efficiently."
Hotrocket/Rocketfuel has won industry attention with its multi-platform children's product, "CIE." After winning "most promising new company honours at the Canadian New Media Awards in 2006, the company became one of just two Canadian projects supported this year by the TELUS Innovation Fund.
More recently, the CIE project topped an international field at the Kidscreen Summit in New York, at the world's top "kids entertainment industry" competition.
Suriano's partner, Ken Bautista, made the successful pitch in New York. Executives from the Disney empire, Nickelodeon and YTV Corus Entertainment group applauded his presentation explaining on the Central Institute for Exploration, the CIE product that uses clues to help kids rescue agents who've been trapped in Alberta's dinosaur times.
The Royal Tyrrell Museum and other Alberta landmarks are also part of the interactive story, Suriano points out. It allows youngsters who find dinosaurs and paleontology interesting to form an online "community" for learning.
Another long-serving organization, the Alberta Motor Association, is also a Hotrocket client, he adds. By playing online games on the AMA website, children can learn street safety and earn "respect points" for later use.
At the same time, he adds, the online experience reinforces the client's values, including safety for bicycle riders and other students. On another tack, Suriano says Hotrocket is developing interactive programs for Alberta Advanced Education, aimed at heightening young Albertans' interest in the trades and technologies.
Some of those in-demand trades might involve restaurants, a field in which Suriano is quite familiar. Lethbridge born and raised, he earned his bachelor's degree at the U of L before heading to Edmonton to work on a master's program at the University of Alberta.
So many Lethbridge-area readers will remember him from his days waiting tables at the Coco Pazzo Italian Cafe, he adds.
"Working at the restaurant put me through my first degree."