Social games giant Zynga has announced that it will be cutting a whopping 18 percent of its workforce. That number translates into about 520 jobs lost in an effort to reduce its costs and refocus on mobile gaming. The cuts will allow the San Francisco based company to recuperate 80 million dollars in staff costs. It will also result in the closure of Zynga offices in New York, Los Angeles, Austin and Dallas.
“None of us ever expected to face a day like today, especially when so much of our culture has been about growth. But I think we all know this is necessary to move forward,” said Zynga CEO Mark Pincus in a memo to its staff. “The scale that served us so well in building and delivering the leading social gaming service on the Web is now making it hard to successfully lead across mobile and multiplatform, which is where social games are going to be played.”
This is just more evidence that the gaming industry, even the social gaming component, is getting too big to support itself. Industry leaders will have to rethink the way they sell games or else many of our favorite AAA companies are going to face the same problems that Zynga is facing now.
Source: Gamespot