Shareholders want regime change at Take-Two Interactive

Investors at Take-Two Interactive are taking control of their own destiny by staging a coup. The investors who own a combined total of 46% of the company want to boot out Chief Executive Paul Eibeler and possibly Chief Financial Officer Karl Winters. The group also wants to put the former chief executive of BMG Entertainment as a non-executive chairman.

Strauss Zelnick is the group’s pick to basically sit as a figurehead non-executive chairman, a part-time position with no real power. Zelnick is no stranger to video games because BMG Entertainment used to have its own game division, but it was sold in n1998 to, you guessed it, Take-Two Interactive.

Take-Two Interactive’s financial and public image problems could be fueling the coup. Former chief executive Ryan Brant was convicted of illegally back-dating stock options last month. Some conservative anti-violence crusaders, like Jack Thompson, have continually tried to force the company to stop selling games like Grand Theft Auto and Bully.