THE GAME is up for the management of SCi Entertainment, the embattled games publisher and owner of the Lara Croft franchise. Furious shareholders have demanded their resignation in the wake of the company’s latest profit warning.

The position of chief executive Jane Cavanagh at the company she founded 20 years ago was this weekend described as “untenable” by one top investor. Her husband, Bill Ennis, who is commercial director, and the chairman, Tim Ryan, are also under fire.

On Friday the company’s corporate brokers at Citigroup told the chairman that investors wanted the management out. Sources close to the company said Phil Rogers, the finance director who joined in February 2007, is being lined up as temporary chief executive until a replacement is found.

Meanwhile, it emerged that SCi will be forced to borrow at least £30m to stay afloat until the end of the year.

One analyst said: “It seems likely the company will run out of cash by May or June. Since it is now delaying the release of its new games, it will need this extra cash just to keep the lights on.”

On Thursday SCi’s share price crashed as the maker of the Tomb Raider computer games issued a shock profit warning and said its bid talks were over and it was running out of cash.

The company, which has said since September that it was in talks with a number of parties, admitted that it “no longer believes that a sale of the company for its full value is likely to be achieved”.

France’s Ubisoft and media giant Time Warner were said to be interested, but the shares fell 65% over the past five months as hopes of a genuine bid faded.

This weekend, sources close to the company told The Sunday Times that the board never actually received a single firm offer.

The shares tanked from highs of 520p in July 2007 to close at 68p on Friday. One of the biggest losers was entrepreneur Robert Tchenguiz who has lost an estimated £80m. He owns more than 15% of the company and bought most of it when the shares were around 500p.

He and other investors were left reeling, wondering what had happened, particularly as Cavanagh had insisted all was well at the company.

In the bombshell announcement, SCi also said it had delayed the release of four titles, including Tomb Raider: Underworld, by six months to Christmas 2008. “As a result of these changes the board now expects that the company will make an operating loss in 2008,” it said.

The company now plans to release the four games across all six major platforms, adding editions for Nintendo’s Wii console and DS hand-held device as well as the Playstation 2.

An analyst said: “The games are now being delayed later and over more platforms, which is going to cost more money. It is money that the company doesn’t have.”

Since 2006 the company has been involved in what the Association of British Insurers called “flagrant breaches of corporate governance” and a legal spat over the ownership of flagship game Battle Stations Midway.

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