Niantic has confirmed that it has laid off 68 staff, following the sale of its games business.
It was announced last month that Pokemon Go, Monster Hunter Now, and the rest of Niantic’s games business was being sold to Monopoly Go maker Scopely in a deal worth $3.5 billion, but it has since emerged that there will be layoffs at its new company Niantic Spatial, as a result of its “new focus”.
Now, as spotted by Game Developer, a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification report published in California has revealed the extent of these layoffs.
According to the report, a total of 68 permanent layoffs were processed at Niantic, Inc on March 20 and will be carried out on May 20.
This is the second time in recent years that Niantic has carried out a notable number of layoffs at once. In June 2023 it was announced that Niantic was closing its Los Angeles studio and laying off 230 employees.
According to an internal email reportedly sent to employees at the time by Niantic founder John Hanke, the studio’s revenue increased drastically during the Covid-19 pandemic but its “expenses [grew] faster than revenue” and it was no longer meeting its internal goals. The company also closed down its NBA All-World Game and cancelled its planned Marvel: World of Heroes title.
Niantic, the developer that shot to fame due to the overwhelming success of Pokemon Go, now boasts over 30 million monthly active users across Pokémon Go, Monster Hunter Now, Pikmin Bloom and more.
Scopely was acquired in 2023 by Savvy Games Group, the investment company owned by Saudi Arabia’s state-backed Public Investment Fund led by Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman.
The PIF, which has made a series of investments in the video games industry in recent years, is reportedly central to bin Salman’s goal of making the Saudi economy less reliant on proceeds from oil. Its investments in the video game industry has raised concerns for some, given Saudi Arabia’s longstanding history of human rights abuses, and a 2021 CIA report accusing the crown prince of ordering the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.
