As part of a studio-wide cost-cutting move, Warner Bros. Entertainment is expected to cut almost 1 000 jobs worldwide in late October and early November this year. The estimated reductions would amount to more than 10% of the studio’s 9 000 person workforce.
Dee Dee Myers, Warner Bros. executive vice president of corporate communications has stipulated that the reductions come as a result of a budget issue and not a head count issue.
In a memo Warner Bros. staff on 4 September 2013, Kevin Tsujihara, Warner CEO, made it clear that layoffs were to be expected at every level of the studio but did not disclose which of the divisions would be hit the hardest.
In recent years, Warner Bros. has been the most consistently successful among the Big Six Studios, however in 2014 the company suffered a number of box office misses including Winter’s Tale, Transcendence and Edge of Tomorrow.
The substantial job reductions at Warner Bros. come at a period when parent company Time Warner faces pressure from Wall Street and investors to reduce costs after spurning Rupert Murdoch’s $80 billion recent takeover bid. The stock, which had soared above $87 a share after the offer was revealed on 16 July 2014, plunged to $72 a share following the withdrawal by Murdoch on 5 August.
Other Time Warner holdings under scrutiny at the moment include Turner Broadcasting, which began offering buyouts to an estimated 600 of its U.S. employees last month. Turner owns CNN and TBS, among other networks, and is expected to make a decision on how many positions it will eradicate once the buyout process is complete.
