Bloomberg reports that Fortnite developer Epic Games is expected to lay off 16 percent of its workforce, or around 900 people.
In a statement from Tim Sweeney, Epic has confirmed the layoffs. He wrote that the company intends to divest from Bandcamp — an independent music storefront company Epic acquired just last year — and spin off SuperAwesome, a “kid-tech” company that specializes in creating safe online experiences for kids. He also explains that the layoffs are a result of the company “spending way more money than we earn.” Notably, Sweeney does not apologize to his employees for making the business decisions that have resulted in the disruption of roughly 900 lives, saying only that his “optimism” that such spending would not result in layoffs was “unrealistic.”
There were rumors that Epic was expected to implement layoffs this year. According to Verge reporter Alex Heath, the company was seeking investment and speculated layoffs as a means to reduce expenses might make it easier to raise funds.
Now, with Epic’s layoffs expected to impact a staggering amount of people, the video game job market is looking to be as tight as it’s ever been.
