Amazon Lays Off Over 100 Workers From Game Division, Including San Diego Studio

SAN DIEGO, CA — Amazon will cut more than 100 jobs from its video game division, workers were told in a memo Tuesday, which said the layoffs would affect employees of the division’s San Diego studio as well as workers with Prime Gaming and Game Growth at the company.

The job losses follow division leadership’s evaluation of existing projects against long-term goals, said Christoph Hartmann, vice president of Amazon Games, in the memo, published in full by CNBC.

Some employees will be reassigned to different projects, according to the memo, while those leaving Amazon will receive severance, health benefits, outplacement services and paid time to conduct a job search.

“Going forward, our resources will be aligned to support our focus on content,” Hartmann said, adding the game division was expanding publishing efforts and optimizing retail and backend teams.

“The New World team in Irvine will grow as we shift some resources to further support its continued development. Our studio in Montreal will continue to expand, and is making great progress on their unannounced project. And the San Diego studio will double down on the pre-production phase of their unannounced game, as that project is not yet ready for a full production size team.”

The division has released only one internally developed game — New World — since it was started in 2012, according to Bloomberg, which also reported gaming executive John Smedley, who helped operate the office in San Diego, announced he would depart a few months ago.

In March, news broke that Amazon planned to eliminate 9,000 jobs in the coming weeks, on top of the 18,000 workers the company said it would lay off in January.

Tens of thousands of job cuts have hit the tech sector in recent months, including at the parent companies of industry giants such as Facebook and Google.