James Hursthouse is a twenty-year veteran of the global games and digital media sector. He has proven success across content development and publishing, infrastructure and technology for ‘games as a service’, and with technologies such as mixed reality, blockchain and artificial intelligence. He was a contributing author to ‘The Metaverse Roadmap’ whitepaper as far back as 2007 and has been developing initiatives that could be considered precursors to the current ‘Metaverse boom’ for over fifteen years. James moved to Vancouver, BC in 2010 to co-found and be the CEO of Roadhouse Interactive. He co-founded Cooper’s New Reality Garage, an augmented reality mobile game studio in 2017. CNRG was acquired by Truly Social Games in 2018, which in turn was acquired by LEAF Mobile in 2021. He co-founded PlayChannel Inc., a mobile game developer and publisher focused on prizing-supercharged mobile game experiences, in 2019.

James is now leading Departure Lounge Inc. as founder and CEO. Departure Lounge was formally incorporated in June 2021 to explore a range of Metaverse-focused technology and content opportunities. The company recently announced its partnership with holographic capture pioneers, Metastage, Inc., to form Metastage Canada, and launch Metastage Vancouver in Q2 2022. 

James sits on the board of DigiBC - the Creative Technology Industry Association of BC, and the board of Canada's Digital Technology Supercluster.