Microsoft closed its Activision Blizzard acquisition in October 2023, and now it is firing 1,900 employees from Activision Blizzard, Xbox, and ZeniMax. According to The Verge, the former is feeling the brunt of the layoffs. Current Blizzard president Mike Ybarra, whose role was to oversee the acquisition, resigned separately alongside Blizzard cofounder and chief design officer Allen Adham.
According to an internal memo from Phil Spencer, employees impacted by these layoffs will be directly notified and provided severance packages when leaving. If they're lucky, these packages will be akin to or better than Riot Games' generous six-month severance, especially considering the $69 billion cost of Microsoft's acquisition. However, the scale of the severance package isn't disclosed in the memo; the only information is the number of employees being laid off.
