According to Kotaku, two of the men most responsible for Microsoft’s success–J Allard and Robbie Bach– in the console video game business industry are leaving the company. Allard, Chief Experience Officer and Chief Technology Officer, Entertainment and Devices Division, masterminded the launch of Xbox in 2001. While rumors were swirling over the weekend that J Allard would be exiting, Bach’s exit comes as a more of a shocker. The president of Microsoft’s Entertainment & Devices Division, Bach’s been with Microsoft for more than twenty years and has been behind some of E&D’s biggest wins of late, like Windows Phone 7 and the highly-anticipated Project NATAL add-on for the Xbox 360.
Bach’s supposed to stay on until the fall but Allard’s status remains unclear. The guessing game now is about where these two will wind up. With the contribution that they’ve made to the video gaming industry, their Windows Phones are probably racking up the voicemails right now.