Twitch has handed out pink slips to a few dozen of its employees. The streaming service, best known for its gaming content, has laid off an unspecified number of employees. According to one source, the cuts included “more than 25 people.”
Polygon, which first reported the news of the layoffs, shared a statement from Twitch in which the company explained the rationale behind its wave of firings. The statement cites “adjustments in some departments” as a cause of the cuts, though it also underlined the advances Twitch has made in recent months, including its deal with the Overwatch League and the record-setting exploits of streamer Ninja. Though it is handing out pink slips now, Twitch plans to increase its workforce by about 30% in 2018. Should it meet that goal, it will add about 450 employees to its payroll, Variety noted.
While Twitch itself did reveal the specific number of employees who have lost there job, one source said the total is at least 25. That insider also painted a picture of discontent at the streaming service.
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Some Twitch employees were fired by new Twitch VP of Content Michael Aragon who wasn’t even in the office and did this via a remote Google Hangouts call. Employees were told to leave immediately. Morale is at an all-time low at Twitch, with one saying “We got amazon’d. Sad day.”
— Rod Breslau (@Slasher) March 30, 2018
Twitch is owned by Amazon, which purchased the platform back in 2014 for a reported price of $970 million. CEO Emmett Shear (pictured above) leads Twitch from the company’s San Francisco headquarters.
