Yves Guillemot has broken his public silence following the death of his brother Claude Guillemot, one of the five co-founders of Ubisoft, who died in an aircraft crash on June 19. Writing on LinkedIn, the Ubisoft CEO offered a personal tribute and thanked the global gaming and tech community for the outpouring of support his family has received.
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The man behind the company's origins
Claude was the eldest of the five Guillemot brothers, a group that includes Christian, Gérard, Michel, and Yves. Their story starts not in a studio, but on a farm in Brittany, France, where the brothers helped their parents with agriculture sales, distribution, and management. After university, they diversified into selling agricultural products before pivoting to CD audio media and, eventually, computers, software, and video games. That pivot became Ubisoft.
Beyond Ubisoft, Claude served as president and CEO of Guillemot Corporation, a company focused on hardware accessories for PCs, mobile devices, and consoles. His fingerprints were on the business long before Assassin's Creed or Far Cry ever existed.
Yves Guillemot's tribute in full context
In his LinkedIn post, Yves described the ten days since Claude's death as a period his family has navigated with the help of thousands of messages from employees, players, and partners worldwide.
"On behalf of my family and Ubisoft, I want to express our gratitude for your support, and the memories you have shared. They have brought us great comfort," Yves wrote. He specifically named Claude's wife Nathalie and their three children, Valentin, Julia, and Victoria, as the family's primary focus during this period.
The tribute went further than corporate condolences. Yves described Claude as someone with a "remarkable ability to connect with people," someone who gave his full attention whether speaking with a longtime partner or someone he had just met. That quality, Yves argued, shaped Ubisoft's culture from the ground up.
"His entrepreneurial spirit, curiosity, and unwavering optimism" helped shape how the studio approached innovation, Yves wrote, noting that Claude "embraced new technologies early" and encouraged the team to look ahead with confidence.
What this means for Ubisoft going forward
Ubisoft is already navigating one of the more turbulent stretches in its history, with significant restructuring underway and multiple high-profile projects in development. The loss of a co-founder carries weight beyond the personal, particularly when that person is described as having helped define the company's internal culture and values from day one.
Here's the thing: Ubisoft's current challenges are operational and strategic, but the Guillemot family's founding role has always been the company's connective tissue. Claude's death is a reminder of just how much of what Ubisoft is today traces back to five brothers making decisions around a kitchen table in rural France.
For players following Ubisoft's output closely, the studio has confirmed multiple Assassin's Creed and Far Cry titles are in development. The work continues. If you want to keep up with everything Ubisoft-adjacent in the meantime, our gaming guides cover the latest from across the publisher's active franchises, including a full breakdown of Rainbow Six Siege Operation Silent Hunt and a dedicated Solid Snake loadout and abilities guide for players jumping into Y11S1.
