With a game created on the pretense of stacking building blocks coupled with a passion for entrepreneurship, one local man has constructed a video game software empire for himself. Chances are that no matter what style of video game system or game genre, Henk Rogers of Blue Planet Software has had a hand in developing some part of the technology that provides hours of entertainment for you or your children.

Most don’t know this, but Blue Planet Software was founded right here in Honolulu and is one of the world’s most successful software gaming developers. However, it was a long road to arrive at that point for Rogers. “Business downturns are tough when you’re not a public company with deep pockets. Having to close companies or otherwise let people go who have become your friends is really hard,” says Rogers.

Yet, through it all, he has always persevered. A perfect blend of video game fanatic and businessman extraordinaire, Rogers has been the visionary and main designer for numerous start-up companies, the most notable of which helped bring Tetris, one of the world’s most popular video games, to the United States and world market.

When asked how he came up with the idea of starting his first tech company, he says it’s always “been in his blood.” This should come as no surprise, as ever since the Holland-born Rogers was a child, he’s had a passion for math, science and computers.

Moving to the United States at age 11, he attended the prestigious math and science Stuyvesent High School in New York City. He then went on to earn a degree in computer science at the University of Hawaii before being drawn to Japan’s budding video game culture in the late 70’s.

Combining his formal training in computer science with his passion for video games, Rogers formed his first company in 1983. The company, Bullet Proof Software, was an instance success. With the development of The Black Onyx, the country’s first-ever role playing game (RPG), he helped transform the way video games were played for decades to follow.

It wasn’t until several years later, when a new friendship formed, that Rogers catapulted himself into the global gaming arena. In 1989, he traveled to Moscow, Russia to inquire about distribution rights of a popular emerging video game that was, at the time, being distributed in several countries under the color of a master license agreement, which the original licensee had not honored. That game, Tetris, was created by Alexey Pajitnov, who Rogers quickly formed a tight bond with.

Although there were two other companies bidding for the distribution rights of Tetris, Rogers’ multilingual skills and his breadth of knowledge of global gaming coupled with his friendship with Pajitnov helped him secure exclusive distribution rights on behalf of his new partner, gaming conglomerate, Nintendo.

For Nintendo, this deal squeezed its rival, Atari, out of the market and launched Tetris into mainstream gaming culture, selling more than 35 million units in conjunction with Game Boy, one of the very first hand-held gaming systems.

Always seeking new business opportunities, Rogers and Pajitnov established AnimaTek in the United States in 1990. AnimaTek pioneered such ground-breaking technologies as automatic animation of virtual characters and computer-generated procedural landscape and vegetation.

When the rights for Tetris reverted from Nintendo back to Pajitnov in 1996, Rogers moved from Japan to Hawaii and founded Blue Planet Software and a subsidiary company, the Tetris Company, to manager the intellectual property rights for Tetris.

And as if bearing the exclusive rights to one of the best-selling video games of all time wasn’t enough, Rogers founded Blue Lava Wireless in 2002 to develop mobile phone computer game software. Besides Tetris, other games developed and published by Blue Lava include Tetris Deluxe, Blue Blocks, Pinball Dragon and Dell Magazine Crosswords.

In perhaps the biggest deal of his entire career, Rogers sold Blue Lava Wireless to Jamdat in 2005, along with the mobile game rights to Tetris. The deal, worth about $137 million in cash and stock, allowed Jamdat to distribute Tetris on wireless phones in Latin America, India, Europe, China, Japan, Korea, Australia and New Zealand.

Rogers initially had no intention of selling the company. "I was looking for a strategy where I would hook up with a company that has stronger marketing and sales than I do," Rogers said. "It never was my intention to go public, so when other people started going public, I would have to compete with public marketing dollars. So if I couldn’t beat 'em, [I thought I should] join 'em.”

This business model is something that Rogers recommends to others who currently own, or are thinking about starting, their own tech companies. “If someone offers you enough money, sell. You get to do it again,” he says.

Rogers is surely happy with his decision to sell, especially since Jamdat has allowed Blue Lava and all of its employees to remain in Hawaii. Doing business in Hawaii, Rogers believes, is integral to Blue Lava’s success. Since most of the top hardware and software manufacturers are located throughout the Pacific Rim, Blue Planet’s central location greatly facilitates timely communication with all of these companies. “I didn't entertain (offers from) anybody who wasn't going to keep the Hawaii studio,” said Rogers.

In addition to catering to the global nature of Blue Planet’s work, staying in Hawaii has meant that Rogers is able to continue spending three days a week on his ranch, doing some “save the planet kind of stuff.” The “save the planet kind of stuff” that Rogers’ mentions is actually his mission to end the use of carbon-based fuels in an effort to halt global warming.

And if his passion for saving the global environment is anywhere close to his passion for making Blue Planet Software a success for years to come, we all stand to benefit.

When asked to share the secret of Blue Planet’s success, Rogers takes a different approach than most technology leaders do. “We are a brand management company. If something does not move the brand forward, [we don’t do it]. In the long term, we are successful because Tetris is still an awesome brand after all these years,” says Rogers.

Of course, Blue Planet wouldn’t enjoy the success it does today without all of its great employees either. Rogers makes it a point to “hire people who live and breathe technology. I spend plenty of time bouncing ideas off of them to know where we are on the leading (not bleeding) edge [of technological innovation].”

Besides managing the company’s brand and hiring a great team, Rogers remains competitive in the industry by always making sure he knows what’s going on inside and outside of the company and doing whatever it takes to become number one in the industry.

Today, Tetris continues to successfully evolve into multiple platforms, recently passing the 70 million units sold mark. Tetris is the world’s most popular computer game and Blue Planet currently holds the exclusive intellectual property distribution rights to the game. Rogers’ vision for Blue Planet and Tetris is to turn Tetris into the first virtual sport with professional players in every city in the world.

Now with 11 years under his belt as CEO and owner of Blue Planet Software, and over 30 years in the gaming software industry, Henk Rogers is positioned to continue making great strides in the gaming world. He has built a successful video game empire right here in Hawaii and will continue climbing to new heights, one Tetris block at a time.