Message from Mike Morhaime

[AdamSavage]

Noticed this on Twitter.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/266 ... e-Morhaime

Everyone,

We announced today that we’re in the process of cutting a number of active positions, mostly non-development, throughout the company. I'm sure this announcement has sparked some questions from all of you, so I want take this opportunity to address those as best I can. Over the past several years, the company has grown rapidly and evolved to better serve you and the rest of our global community. Thanks to all of your support, we continue to serve by far the biggest subscription-based MMO community, as well as the most passionate eSports and online gaming communities, in the world.

In order to keep making epic game content while serving players effectively, we have to be smart about how we manage our resources. This means we sometimes have to make difficult decisions about how to best maintain the health of the company. We’re in the process of making some of those hard decisions now.

After evaluating our current organizational needs, we determined that while some areas of our business had been operating at the right levels and could benefit from further growth, other areas had become overstaffed. As a result, we need to scale down some of our departments and part with some of our colleagues and friends here at Blizzard. I know that you all understand how difficult this type of situation can be for anyone who might be affected, so I want to assure you that we'll be offering each impacted employee a severance package and other benefits.

I also want to emphasize that we remain committed to shipping multiple games this year, and that our development teams in particular remain largely unaffected by today's announcement. We're continuing to develop, iterate, and polish Blizzard DOTA, Diablo III, StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm, World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria, as well as other, unannounced projects. We'll have exciting news to share in the coming weeks regarding Diablo III's release date, and will soon be holding a private media event to showcase the latest work on Mists of Pandaria. It goes without saying that we're working hard to get all of these games in your hands as soon as possible.

You've all come to expect Blizzard to live up to our mission statement with every game, and deliver the most epic entertainment experiences ever. You can continue to expect that and nothing less from us as we move forward.

-Mike Morhaime

[Lisaara]

Doesn't seem like WoW is affected but still....sad that it has to be that way.

[GormanGhaste]

wonder where the majority of the cuts are?

[Silivren]

I hate when businesses do that.. Its like saying "Welp your not needed anymore /have a cookie." I think its so rude.

[Lisaara]

It's a lot more than that Vulp. Economy is in the pits right now and businesses are hurting, including Blizz. They're not doing it cause they want to. It's cause they have to.

[Silivren]

Honestly tbh, it doesnt matter to me what so ever. I will stick to that, to toss out your employees because your a corporation which makes a lot of money is ridiculous. I dont respect them at all for this and I wont. Even more so because the economy is in the dumps so you kick your workers to the curb? Hey fend for yourselves we'll give you what we want and then your on your own buddy. Being respectful doesnt work that way to me and it never will.

[Lisaara]

Um..Blizz is actually tiny compared to most huge corporate companies.

[AdamSavage]

Some more on this. Apparently they laid off 600 employes..

http://www.gamespot.com/news/blizzard-l ... 00-6360584

[Chimera]

oh wow....

[cowmuflage]

These things sadly happen.

[AdamSavage]

To give you an idea of how much they make a year before any cost involved. Take $15/month x 10 million subs, that works out to be about $150,000,000/month.

[Chimera]

yea, to think that they culled that many people when they pull in that money, i really doubt they use up the amount they get a month in subs alone in their real crafted items and maintaining the company. Like.. it just seems to be way too much money to say that they have been struggling to make it.

Its understandable that culling is an unfortunate neccessity when theres too much surplus and im glad to read that they are getting severence packages and benefits to help ease them out of the company and hopefully they'll find new work before it runs out but i personally think that relocation to different departments should of been an option-- if it wasnt thought of that is, i dont know if they tried to relocate some instead of laying them off.

Still tho, all in all its sad. But when theres surplus of individuals, there are few options and even fewer still if you cant relocate them elsewhere.

[cowmuflage]

yea, to think that they culled that many people when they pull in that money, i really doubt they use up the amount they get a month in subs alone in their real crafted items and maintaining the company. Like.. it just seems to be way too much money to say that they have been struggling to make it.

Its understandable that culling is an unfortunate neccessity when theres too much surplus and im glad to read that they are getting severence packages and benefits to help ease them out of the company and hopefully they'll find new work before it runs out but i personally think that relocation to different departments should of been an option-- if it wasnt thought of that is, i dont know if they tried to relocate some instead of laying them off.

Still tho, all in all its sad. But when theres surplus of individuals, there are few options and even fewer still if you cant relocate them elsewhere.

Yup perfectly said.

We don't have the full picture but they proberly did try relocate them as useally laying someone off is the final straw kind of thing. Really as outsiders we can't fully judge a company unless we have the full picture of what was going on inside the company. Alot of times you can't relocate people they may not have the right skills or might not work well in that environment but sometimes you can reskill people but sometimes you can't.

[Chimera]

Yea, if you dont know what your looking at then you really have no idea how it works and why its doing what its doing. I totally agree that removing someone entirely is a last straw thing, so most likley they relocated who they could and let go of those who werent able to be relocated, i personally kinda get irked when people leave out details like that. At first glance it gives the idea that they simply cut down on staff and it requires a bit more thought to come up with a theory that they probably tried to salvage their jobs before making the unfortunate decisions. But thats just me XD I like as many key details and explanations laid out as possible if relevant to the topic.

[Lisaara]

They're not really allowed to give out more intimate details but seriously, the stuff Blizz develops, including the new technology, costs A LOT of money and WoW alone cannot support that.

[Chimera]

150million dollars a month.. im not sure it costs anywhere near that much a month to do what they're doing

[Lisaara]

150million dollars a month.. im not sure it costs anywhere near that much a month to do what they're doing

Where did you get that math? O_o;

Even so, you'd be surprised. Developing new gaming tech alone costs a few mill...not to mention bills to pay, employees to pay....upgrades to buy, etc.

[AdamSavage]

150million dollars a month.. im not sure it costs anywhere near that much a month to do what they're doing

Where did you get that math? O_o;

Even so, you'd be surprised. Developing new gaming tech alone costs a few mill...not to mention bills to pay, employees to pay....upgrades to buy, etc.

It cost $15 to play the game monthly, and 10 million accounts pay this $15 each month. 10 million + 15 = 150 Million each month. If you want to really see crazy numbers, take that 150 million and times it by 12 months. You now have $1,800,000,000 ($1.8 Billion before any cost are taken away etc.)yearly just from subs alone, this doesn't include people buying mounts, pets, faction change, name change etc etc. Plus you have the cost of just buying the game to begin with.

[Lisaara]

Thats if all 10 million accounts are active. And pay with that fee. Not all do the $15 a month. I dont. I pay the cheaper way, which is 6 month plan.

And do you have any idea what their electric bills are? As well as paying every since one of their employees that work many hours on the games we play? Plus Blizzcon....and then theres Taxes....California is super expensive to live in.

Back when gas was like $2.50 a gallon in FL, in Cali it was $4.75.

[AdamSavage]

That's if all 10 million accounts are active. And pay with that fee. Not all do the $15 a month. I don't. I pay the cheaper way, which is 6 month plan.

Slightly cheaper, and it's just a rough number. I'll never get an exact number. Either way, they are not a company that is hurting for cash right now.