Rovio has confirmed that 110 people will lose their jobs as the Angry Birds maker also shuts down its game-development studio in Tampere. The layoffs, first announced in October, amount to about 14 percent of the company's workforce.
It had been expected that Rovio would make 130 people redundant but after a round of consultations this number has now been reduced. Rovio said that as a result of the redundancies "several positions" have been opened for internal applications. The actual number of employees out of work will depend on how many new internal positions are filled.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 06 2014, @05:19PM
You don't think the merchandising makes them money? I think that's actually a Rovio success story.
"Angry Birds The Game" was a genuine success. "Angry Birds the merchandising" is a potential long tail that will continue bringing in money: http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/28/angry-birds-rovio-revenues/ [techcrunch.com]
"Angry Birds The Game Sequel #whatever", not so much. Why pay hundreds of programmers $$$ to make games that will never sell enough to pay for their salaries? So they have to cut overheads.
Like it or not, the MBAs didn't kill "Angry Birds The Game". It had a finite lifespan and died a natural death. Just like the "draw my thing" game (which had zero merchandising potential, so the guy really got lucky he managed to get the $$$$$$ and jump off before the crash ;) ). I hardly see anyone play Angry Birds or the sequels. I see people playing Clash of Clans, some driving game, and zillions of other games.
I'm not so sure that Angry Birds The Movie is a good idea though, unless they have Pixar grade talent (in which case that could make them lots of money).