Games developer Electronic Arts to cut 5% of workforce
Chief executive Andrew Wilson said the company is scrapping work on new and future franchises to focus on existing, popular titles.
Video games developer Electronic Arts (EA) has announced it is cutting 5% of its staff – about 670 employees – as part of cost-cutting and a restructuring of its business.
In an email to staff announcing the cuts, EA chief executive Andrew Wilson said the company is moving away from creating new games to instead focus on its “owned IP, sports, and massive online communities”.
Mr Wilson said the company will, as a result, stop work on some in-development games and cancel other planned titles “that we do not believe will be successful in our changing industry”, and instead “double down” on its existing titles – which includes EAFC, the football game series formerly known as Fifa.
He said the company is “leading through an accelerating industry transformation where player needs and motivations have changed significantly”.
“Our industry exists at the cutting edge of entertainment, and in today’s dynamic environment, we are advancing the way we work and continuing to evolve our business.
“In this time of change, we expect these decisions to impact approximately 5% of our workforce.
“I understand this will create uncertainty and be challenging for many who have worked with such dedication and passion and have made important contributions to our company.
“While not every team will be impacted, this is the hardest part of these changes, and we have deeply considered every option to try and limit impacts to our teams.”
EA has not confirmed publicly which teams will be affected by the cuts.
The games developer has several offices in the UK, including in Guildford, Birmingham and Manchester, as well as in Galway in Ireland.
The announcement comes days after Sony confirmed it is cutting about 900 jobs from its PlayStation division, including closing its London studio.
It also follows EA’s previous job cuts, announced in March last year, which saw about 6% of its workforce laid off, and Microsoft confirming last month it is cutting 1,900 jobs.
The cuts in the gaming industry follow a wider trend of downsizing across the wider tech sector in response to ongoing economic uncertainty around the world.
