(Scypre.com) – Disney will cut thousands of jobs next week.
The company will cut 15% of its staff in its entertainment division, according to people familiar with the plans.
This includes every region where Disney operates. The cuts will include those in TV, film, theme parks and corporate teams.
Disney Entertainment, a unit created in a restructuring this year, would also be impacted, the report said.
As soon as Monday, some workers will be notified.
The company announced in February that it was cutting its payroll. The news was in the earnings report.
Bob Iger, the company’s CEO, made the announcement during the first-quarter earnings call.
The job cuts are part of Disney’s plan to save $5.5 billion, which includes cutting operating costs and reducing non-sports content.
The actions of Wall Street and tech giants have led to layoffs at Disney.
The pink slips are flying this week at Walt Disney Co. as the entertainment giant seeks to slash billions of dollars in costs.
Bob Iger confirmed in an email Monday that a first round of layoffs has begun. Iger said in the email that Disney plans to cut 7,000 jobs in three waves, with the first coming this week, the next in April and a final round by the beginning of summer. He wrote that Disney’s cost-saving measures will create a “streamlined approach to our business.”.
Disney officials said in a conference call last month that the job cuts will save the company $5.5 billion. “In tough moments, we must always do what’s required to ensure Disney can continue delivering exceptional entertainment to audiences and guests around the world,” he wrote.
The past few years have been difficult for the House of Mouse. Disney lost billions of dollars in the early years of the Pandemic when it had to stop in-person productions of movies and TV shows. Disney raised admission prices for the Magic Kingdom, Epcot and Hollywood studios after the parks reopened in April 2021.
Disney’s television production and acquisitions departments have been the focus of the first round of layoffs.
Disney’s growth has been dragged down by its enormous investment in streaming, including its flagship Disney+ platform. Although the company has quickly become a major player in the fiercely competitive online video business, the high cost of producing content has left its streaming assets deep in the red. The company had a $1 billion loss in its direct-to-consumer arm.
Disney competes with other companies in the market for streaming services. During a town hall meeting in November, Iger told employees that one way to make streaming profitable is to stop chasing subscribers and spend more on marketing.
Bob Chapek was fired as CEO of Disney in November and was replaced by Robert Iger. Wall Street analysts said one of Iger’s top priorities would be to make Disney’s streaming platforms profitable.
Disney’s entertainment division includes TV shows and streaming networks, as well as parks, experiences and products, which include DisneyWorld, Disney Cruise Line and merchandise.
Disney’s layoffs range from early career animators to senior executives, according to reports. According to the New York Times, the chairman of Marvel Entertainment was among those getting their walking papers. There is a separate department for Perlmutter’s that is responsible for producing superhero blockbusters.
The Wall Street Journal reported that 50 employees who were in charge of expanding Disney into the metaverse will lose their jobs.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Disney’s next generation storytellers and consumer experiences division has been eliminated. The team is thought to have been made up of around 50 employees, and was exploring how Disney could use its existing intellectual property in new ways.
The team was axed in the first round of layoffs at Disney. A total of 7,000 employees are expected to be made redundant across the company. There were rumors of layoffs after Bob Iger took over as Disney CEO.
Disney announced its metaverse ambitions to its employees in February of last year, four months after Facebook renamed itself to Meta. White has worked at Disney for over a decade. He started in the Disney Interactive video games division. “For nearly 100 years, our company has defined and re-defined entertainment by using technology to bring stories to life in deeper, more impactful ways.”.
Although the cuts have taken place under Iger, he appears to be far from a metaverse-skeptic, with WSJ noting that he sits on the board of a startup that helps users create avatars.
There are other companies that are struggling to deliver on big metaverse ambitions. Meta hasn’t been able to build adoption of its technology. The Reality Labs division had an operating loss of $13.72 billion last year, and its first major virtual reality headset release, the Meta Quest Pro, was terrible.