Electronic Arts has terminated 350 employees across marketing, analytics and more just days after GDC 2019.
The unfortunate news comes following a series of lay-offs across the games industry this year, with Activision having let go roughly 800 people earlier in 2019.
Kotaku recently obtained an internal email from Electronic Arts which explains the reason behind the decision:
“We have a vision to be the World’s Greatest Games Company,” writes EA’s Andrew Wilson. “If we’re honest with ourselves, we’re not there right now. We have work to do with our games, our player relationships, and our business.”
“Across the company, teams are already taking action to ensure we are creating higher-quality games and live services, reaching more platforms with our content and subscriptions, improving our Frostbite tools, focusing our network and cloud gaming priorities, and closing the gap between us and our player communities,” he added.
One person part of the affected departments told Kotaku that these layoffs were expected for a while, and some employees will appreciate no longer being in limbo regarding their job security. No matter how you slice it, this situation sucks.
This news comes just a few days after Game Developers Conference 2019, which would’ve been an ideal place for folks looking for work oppurtunities to share CVs and showcase themselves to potential employers. Here’s hoping everyone lands on their feet.
“The changes we’re making today will impact about 350 roles in our 9,000-person company. These are important but very hard decisions, and we do not take them lightly.” Electronic Arts said in a statement.
We are friends and colleagues at EA, we appreciate and value everyone’s contributions, and we are doing everything we can to ensure we are looking after our people to help them through this period to find their next opportunity. This is our top priority.”
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
