GameStop has been on a wild ride since it reached meme stock status, and the company has recently delved into Web3 technologies like NFTs and crypto. More recently, it also fired employees without much explanation. On Thursday, GameStop internally announced an unspecified number of layoffs — reportedly including some from the popular publication Game Informer † and made public that it fired its CFO with a succinct press release.
GameStop CEO Matt Furlong announced round of layoffs to staff in a memo obtained by CNBC and Kotaku† It’s completely unclear how many people have been affected or in which divisions, although Furlong writes in the memo that “we are making some reductions to help us keep things simple and work nimble with the right talent in place.” The layoffs “appear” to be aimed at the company’s headquarters in Grapevine, Texas, according to Kotaku†
Despite the fact that crypto isn’t that popular right now, it seems like GameStop is banking part of its future on its blockchain group – it’s mentioned in the very first line of Furlong’s memo:
Change will be a constant as we develop our trading business and launch new products through our blockchain group. After investing heavily in human resources, technology, inventory and supply chain infrastructure over the past 18 months, our focus is on achieving sustainable profitability. This means eliminating excess costs and working with an intense owner mentality.
GameStop also says it is making “a significant investment” in its store staff, indicating it still believes its stores are important too. “These individuals are in many ways the heart of GameStop,” Furlong wrote. “We will share details about this investment in the coming weeks.”
Company publicly announced the “termination of employment” of CFO Michael Recupero. He will be replaced by Diana Saadeh-Jajeh, the company’s chief accounting officer.
According to axiosDid the layoffs have an impact? Game Informer, which is owned by the video game retailer, although it’s unclear how many people were affected. Some tweets from employees are not positive†