Activision planned to cut a significant number of jobs before being acquired by Microsoft
, by Thibaut
Microsoft has been sharply criticized by the Federal Trade Commission, following a series of layoffs within its teams.
The FTC judged the company for contradicting its own arguments made in court during the Activision Blizzard takeover trial. Indeed, the publisher of Call of Duty was to continue to operate independently once the merger was completed, so Microsoft would not have been in a position to announce job cuts.
Following this accusation, the multinational spoke out through its lawyers. We learn that Activision Blizzard was already planning major layoffs even before the takeover was made official.
"Consistent with broader trends in the gaming industry, Activision was already planning on eliminating a significant number of jobs while still operating as an independent company. The recent announcement (of 1,900 redundancies) thus cannot be attributed fully to the merger."
Source: videogameschronicle.com