Grand Theft Auto publisher Take-Two Interactive has confirmed reports of layoffs at the company.

The impending layoffs were first hinted at in Take-Two's Q3 2023 financial report (opens in new tab), in which CEO Strauss Zelnick said the company is seeking $50, 000 million in annual cuts in "personnel, processes, infrastructure and other areas, particularly in publishing and corporate functions." He stated that the company is seeking to reduce its costs by $10 million.

In an interview with GamesIndustry (opens in new tab), Zelnick made it clear that he "doesn't expect any broad staff reductions," adding that Take-Two is "trying to become more efficient department by department."

Despite this, several layoffs are currently taking place. The layoffs were initially reported by Bloomberg's Jason Schreier on Twitter (open in new tab), who said layoffs were taking place at Take-Two's publishing label Private Division and other divisions. Take-Two later confirmed the report in a statement sent to PC Gamer, but declined to say exactly how many employees would be cut or from which parts of the company.

"We can confirm that targeted reductions have been made, primarily in our U.S. teams in Corporate Operations and Label Publishing, to better align the organization with our long-term priorities," said Alan Lewis, a Take-Two spokesman. We continue to make strategic investments in people and technology for our long-term pipeline, and this change will have minimal impact on our U.S. development team." [Outside of the U.S., we have initiated procedures that may result in similar reductions, in accordance with local laws. Take-Two has grown dramatically over the past few years, and we are taking the necessary steps to ensure further success.

I am no financial expert, but I am always puzzled when a statement like "We have grown by leaps and bounds in recent years" is immediately followed by something like "Therefore, we need to lay off a lot of employees." But it is also puzzling when a company reports quarterly revenue of $1.4 billion (up 56% from the same period last year) and describes it as a disappointment. Big business is a strange thing.

Private Division was founded by Take-Two in 2017 as a publishing label for smaller, indie-focused games. Since then, it has had a number of successes, including "Kerbal Space Program" (opens in new tab), "The Outer Worlds" (opens in new tab), "Hades" (opens in new tab), and "OlliOlli World" (opens in new tab), Kerbal Space Program 2" (opens in new tab), which recently opened for early access, and the engaging adventure platformer "After Us" (opens in new tab), due out this spring.