Ubisoft has announced a major restructuring of its business, with a new operating model that will place its current teams into five specialised ‘Creative Houses’ with dedicated lead studios, but coming at the cost of another round of layoffs, scaled back remote working, and with game cancellations, including the troubled Prince of Persia: Sands of Time Remake.
Beyond Good & Evil 2 is seemingly safe, though.
Yves Guillemot, Ubisoft CEO, explained the plan and reasoning: “On the one hand, the AAA industry has become persistently more selective and competitive with rising development costs and greater challenges in creating brands. On the other hand, exceptional AAA games, when successful, have more financial potential than ever. In this context, today we are announcing a major reset built to create the conditions for a return to sustainable growth over time. We are transforming Ubisoft’s operating model to produce exceptional quality games on the two core pillars of our strategy, Open World Adventures and GaaS-native experiences.
“At the center of this transformation are our Creative Houses, integrated business units now combining production and publishing and therefore unifying the gamer relationship. Each one is built around a clear genre and brand focus, with full responsibility and financial ownership, led by dedicated leadership teams. It is a radical move, relying on a more decentralized creative organization with faster decision making and best-in-class cross functional core services supporting and serving each Creative House.”
The new structure follows the kind of naming convention that we see at Capcom and Nintendo, with numbered divisions that each specialises in a series or genre. We already saw the first step of this with the co-funded Vantage Studios that now looks after Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, Rainbow Six, and this is Creative House 1. Each CH will be more independent and ‘decentralised’, and the financial accountability will be within that division as oppose to Ubisoft as a whole.
The new groups are:
- CH1 (Vantage Studios), focused on scaling and extending Ubisoft’s largest and established franchises to turn them into annual billionaire brands – Brands including Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, Rainbow Six
- CH2 dedicated to competitive and cooperative shooter experiences – Brands including The Division, Ghost Recon, Splinter Cell
- CH3 designed to operate a roster of select, sharp Live experiences – Brands including For Honor, The Crew, Riders Republic, Brawlhalla, Skull & Bones
- CH4 dedicated to immersive fantasy worlds and narrative-driven universes – Brands including Anno, Might & Magic, Rayman, Prince of Persia, Beyond Good & Evil
- CH5 focused on reclaiming position in casual and family-friendly games – Brands including Just Dance, Idle Miner Tycoon
Six games are being cancelled as a consequence of this, including the Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time remake and 4 unannounced titles, three of which were new IPs. However, there are 4 new IPs still in development, including March of Giants.
However, to make this happen, Ubisoft is bringing an end to remote working. All teams will need to return to five days a week on site, though there will be an annual allowance of work from home days. Ubisoft says this is because they want more in-person collaboration and constant knowledge sharing, and all that stuff, but doesn’t mention the positives of remote working, like not having to deal with an energy-sapping and potentially costly commute, having more flexibility with home life and work, and not having to be in an office.
Further to this, Ubisoft’s ‘cost reduction initiatives’ are being pushed further to cut €100 million year on year. Their studio in Halifax closed earlier this month, and their Stockholm studio will follow. There’s also restructuring at Abu Dhabi, RedLynx and Massive. A further €200 million cost reduction is set to take place over the next two years.
Oh, but Ubisoft has the cash to throw at the Generative AI money pit, with “accelerated investments behind player-facing Generative AI.”
This obviously sucks for those affected, and we wish them all the best in finding new employment.
Source: press release
