EA Lays Off 1500 After Acquisition
- Scribbled on November 9th, 2009 by Jonah Falcon
- Filed in Casual Gaming, Industry News
It’s a business tale as old as the hills: big company acquires smaller company, layoffs ensue. G4TV is reporting that Electronic Arts, following its acquisition of PlayFish, has laid off 1,500 employees.
The company announced plans today for a “headcount reduction” (read: layoffs) of roughly 1,500 employees by March 2010. It will also result in the closing of several facilities. It’s unclear what facilities are affected. EA claims the restructuring will provide about $100 million in cost savings.
The news comes on the heels of EA’s acquisition of PlayFish.
“EA is performing well, with quality, sales and segment share up so far this year,” said EA CEO John Riccitiello in the company’s quarertly financial release. “We are making tough calls to cut cost in targeted areas and investing more in our biggest games and digital businesses.”
PlayFish is a “social gaming site”, which publishes casual games that stress community play, like Who Has the Biggest Brain and Word Challenge.
November 17th, 2009 at 11:54 am
[...] are flying that part of the announced layoffs of 1,500 people will include developer Pandemic, which employs roughly 200 people. Though still unconfirmed, [...]