Cynthia Williams

Cynthia Williams
General Information
Status	Inactive: Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty to Outlaws of Thunder Junction

Cynthia Williams is a former President and CEO/COO of Wizards of the Coast (2022-2024). She had replaced Chris Cocks on February 2, 2022, who had been promoted to be CEO of Hasbro.^[1][2]

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Williams joined Hasbro from Microsoft, where she most recently served as General Manager and Vice President of the Gaming Ecosystem Commercial Team, and most notably drove the expansion of Xbox Gaming and the acceleration of game-creator growth. Before joining Microsoft, Williams had spent more than a decade at Amazon, where she led the global growth of their e-commerce direct-to-consumer business Fulfillment by Amazon.

After a tenure of only two years, Cynthia Williams tendered her resignation from the position on April, 15th 2024 and formally resigned on April 26th, 2024.^[3]

During the two years that Williams served as Wizards’ President, the most major change was likely the ramping up of MTG Universes Beyond and Secret Lairs. Other wins for Wizards were in the digital realm. For instance, 2023 saw the release of the most prestigious Dungeons & Dragons game ever: Baldur’s Gate 3 sold 10 million copies. But these years have also seen their fair share of controversy. In 2022, the ire of Magic players was raised by the release of the 30th Anniversary Edition, a commemorative collection of non-legal cards that cost $999. But the uproar around that paled in comparison to the furor that hit Wizards in 2023 when it tried to make changes to the Dungeons & Dragons Open Game License (OGL). On that occasion, the upheaval in the tabletop RPG community was so great that Wizards ultimately walked back its decision entirely. Then, after a surprising and dramatic round of layoffs in December 2023, Wizards of the Coast predicted a revenue slump in 2024.

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