Microsoft’s Xbox video game division CEO Asha Sharma has announced “the most significant restructure in Xbox history” which will involve 3,200 jobs being laid off.
Announced in a memo to staff Monday titled ‘Resetting Xbox’, the changes will take place over the course of a year – 1.600 people are out the door today, the rest to be spread out over the next 12 months or so.
Sharma says: “I recognise that a year-long restructuring creates additional challenges. Unfortunately, it is not possible to make all the necessary changes in a single day, and I wanted to be direct about the scale.”
Multiple game developers are also being overhauled. Compulsion Games (“South of Midnight”) and Double Fine Productions (“Psychonauts”) will be spun out to their management to operate as independent studios.
Ninja Theory (“Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice”) and Undead Labs (“State of Decay”) have secured funding and will operate under new ownership with work to continue on their previously announced “Senua” and “State of Decay 3” projects.
Arkane Lyon will review potential strategic options for the eventual sale or spin-off of the studio. Bethesda is expected be overhauled to focus on its key franchises – namely “Fallout,” “The Elder Scrolls,” “Doom,” “Quake” and “Wolfenstein”.
Sharma said some decisions currently go through 14 layers of management, and the shift will “reduce management layers to no more than 5, and where possible, 3”.
She adds: “These changes are about a bigger future for Xbox, not a smaller one. The next decade of gaming will be larger, more global, and more creative than anything we’ve seen before.”
