As first reported by Game File, Microsoft’s head of gaming Phil Spencer shared the news with employees in a company-wide email on Thursday.
“As part of aligning our post-acquisition team structure and managing our business, we have made the decision to eliminate approximately 650 roles across Microsoft Gaming—mostly corporate and supporting functions—to organize our business for long term success,” Spencer wrote.
“Throughout our team’s history, we have had great moments, and we have had challenging ones. Today is one of the challenging days. I know that going through more changes like this is hard, but even in the most trying times, this team has been able to come together and show one another care and kindness as we work to continue delivering for our players.”
Spencer claimed that the cuts would result in the cancellation of “no games, devices or experiences.”
Spencer’s full message to staff, via IGN, can be found below:
For the past year, our goal has been to minimize disruption while welcoming new teams and enabling them to do their best work. As part of aligning our post-acquisition team structure and managing our business, we have made the decision to eliminate approximately 650 roles across Microsoft Gaming—mostly corporate and supporting functions—to organize our business for long term success.
I know that this is difficult news to hear. We are deeply grateful for the contributions of our colleagues who are learning they are impacted. In the US, we’re supporting them with exit packages that include severance, extended healthcare, and outplacement services to help with their transition; outside the US packages will differ according to location.
With these changes, our corporate and supporting teams and resources are aligned for sustainable future growth, and can better support our studio teams and business units with programs and resources that can scale to meet their needs. Separately, as part of running the business, there are some impacts to other teams as they adapt to shifting priorities and manage the lifecycle and performance of games. No games, devices or experiences are being cancelled and no studios are being closed as part of these adjustments today.
Throughout our team’s history, we have had great moments, and we have had challenging ones. Today is one of the challenging days. I know that going through more changes like this is hard, but even in the most trying times, this team has been able to come together and show one another care and kindness as we work to continue delivering for our players. We appreciate your support as we navigate these changes and we thank you for your compassion and respect for each other.
Phil
That means Xbox has now cut more than 2,500 jobs since it completed its $69bn acquisition of Activision Blizzard.
Microsoft’s head of gaming announced in January that 1,900 staff would be laid off across Activision Blizzard, Bethesda and Xbox. At the time, Phil Spencer claimed that the decision to cut the jobs was ultimately the result of a lack of growth in the games industry.
As part of the previous cuts, Xbox closed Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks and Redfall studio Arkane Austin.
The news followed just a year on from Microsoft’s previous round of layoffs, which partially affected its gaming teams. In January 2023, it confirmed plans to lay off approximately 10,000 employees, or around 4.5% of the US technology giant’s 220,000-person workforce.
The broader games industry has continued to see widespread layoffs, which began to accelerate in 2023 and have continued throughout 2024 with no sign of stopping.
Game developer Farhan Noor, who has been tracking job cuts dating back to the start of 2022 on videogameslayoffs.com, estimates that around 10,500 games industry employees were laid off last year, and that around 11,540 have already been laid off this year so far.
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Source: https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/microsoft-is-cutting-another-650-staff-from-its-gaming-teams/
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