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Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

sonyinteractive.com

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Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#31

Post by ErneX »

this_user wrote: post #14
neocritter wrote: post #4

Is this one of those "we're doing great, you're fired" situations, or is there a real market reason? The PS5 seems to be selling well.

They only recently announced that the PS5 is rapidly reaching its EOL. It is seemingly not selling well at all. The early issues with supply and the lack of actually interesting games that are not just remakes has clearly not helped.

They said it was entering its latter stage, which makes sense given it is been close to 3.5 years since it came out and their generations usually last 7 years.

It is selling pretty well too, I think I read even better than PS4 if you align their launches?

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#32

Post by malfist »

opyate wrote: post #24
nerdjon wrote: post #21

I really wish we had more concrete information on what caused this. Is this a downturn in gaming and revenue and actually needing to do this to stay afloat or just the company seeing lower than expected sales but still profitable. I know that they announced that the PS5 sold lower than expected but they also mentioned exploring other platforms for their games. Playstation has a reputation of all of their games doing…

Of course they're still profitable. But instead of making a gazillion-and-one dollars, like they "forecasted", they only made a gazillion dollars. So, in the interest of "maximising shareholder value" and maintaining "growth", the board has now concluded that heads must roll for this.

But not their heads, mind you. After all, it's the fault of the peons that got hired for getting hired. No one else is to blame for growing the company too fast.

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#33

Post by taion »

nerdjon wrote: post #21

I really wish we had more concrete information on what caused this. Is this a downturn in gaming and revenue and actually needing to do this to stay afloat or just the company seeing lower than expected sales but still profitable. I know that they announced that the PS5 sold lower than expected but they also mentioned exploring other platforms for their games. Playstation has a reputation of all of their games doing…

Matthew Ball had a good essay on this about a month ago: https://www.matthewball.co/all/gaming2024

The industry as a whole is facing huge financial pressures, Sony included.

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#34

Post by Etheryte »

As an aside, I want to take a moment and really appreciate the fact that in the age of bland and boring corporate redesigns, Sony Interactive Entertainment has kept the same gradient square as their logo since 1993. They've updated the typography, but the retro square has persevered.

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#35

Post by nerdjon »

warp wrote: post #30
nerdjon wrote: post #21

I really wish we had more concrete information on what caused this. Is this a downturn in gaming and revenue and actually needing to do this to stay afloat or just the company seeing lower than expected sales but still profitable. I know that they announced that the PS5 sold lower than expected but they also mentioned exploring other platforms for their games. Playstation has a reputation of all of their games doing…

Gaming saw a huge increase during the COVID-19 pandemic, and companies staffed up, because they either had a bunch more money coming in or it was easy to get investments. All these gaming layoffs to me seem like a correction back to pre-covid levels. We've also seen a bunch of consolidation in recent years, which in itself makes some positions redundant.

So I know a lot of the tech (non gaming) layoffs were correcting the over-hiring during covid.

However I did not think gaming did the same thing. Especially given the long development timelines for games now it wouldn't have made as much sense. It isn't like they could hire during the boom and expect to get anything out within a reasonable amount of time.

Is there anything out there talking about gaming also doing a big hiring push during covid?

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#37

Post by toddmorey »

nerdjon wrote: post #21

I really wish we had more concrete information on what caused this. Is this a downturn in gaming and revenue and actually needing to do this to stay afloat or just the company seeing lower than expected sales but still profitable. I know that they announced that the PS5 sold lower than expected but they also mentioned exploring other platforms for their games. Playstation has a reputation of all of their games doing…

Really impressed by how many highly profitable companies have turned themselves inside out to arrive at this same "extremely hard decision." Either those words are a bit empty or you just have to admire recent levels of corporate bravery.

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#38

Post by cwbriscoe »

this_user wrote: post #14
neocritter wrote: post #4

Is this one of those "we're doing great, you're fired" situations, or is there a real market reason? The PS5 seems to be selling well.

They only recently announced that the PS5 is rapidly reaching its EOL. It is seemingly not selling well at all. The early issues with supply and the lack of actually interesting games that are not just remakes has clearly not helped.

The PS5 is selling above PS4 at this time in their respective console cycles.

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#39

Post by [deleted] »

jl6 wrote: post #27

What I would dearly love is for Microsoft and Sony to recognize that nobody wants to release platform-exclusive titles that cut the audience in half, and pivot the console industry away from being mutually-incompatible bespoke devices and towards being a blessed open PC configuration that gets battle-tested, mass produced, and LTS-supported. Architecturally they’re 90% of the way there having AMD CPU+GPUs under the h…

[deleted]

Re: Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 people

#40

Post by seatac76 »

Pathogen-David wrote: post #20

Here's a separate press release from PlayStation Studios has more details: https://sonyinteractive.com/en/news/blog/an-important-update... In particular it lists some other studios not mentioned in this one: The US based studios and groups impacted by a reduction in workforce are: * Insomniac Games, Naughty Dog, as well as our Technology, Creative, and Support teams In UK and European based studios, it is proposed: *…

I was expecting cuts at Naughty Dog once the Factions game got canceled. But the other ones here are more concerning. Guerilla too? Is the Horizons multiplayer also in jeopardy:/
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