Last month, Take-Two announced plans to lay off 5% of its workforce in a cost-cutting measure. That restructuring also leads to the cancellation of unannounced projects. That announcement was soon followed by a Bloomberg report that claimed the publisher plans to close Roll7 and Intercept Games.
Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick denied any plans to shut down the studios in a recent interview with IGN. Although Zelnick suggested that neither of the studios had been shut down, he did not confirm their current status.
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“We didn’t shutter those studios, to be clear,” Zelnick said. “We are always looking at our release schedule across all of our studios to make sure that it makes sense.
“So we are being very judicious because we are in the middle of a cost reduction program that we’ve already concluded and are now fully rolling out. We’ve announced that we’re saving $165 million in existing and future costs, but we haven’t shuttered anything.”
However, believing whatever comes from Zelnick’s mouth is hard. Prior to the announcement of the 5% cut in the company’s workforce, he had said that the company didn’t see any need to make layoffs.
In fact, Jason Schreier of Bloomberg shared two screenshots on X with the caption, “Hey everyone, let’s play a game called What’s The Truth?” The post was followed by a screenshot of Zelnick’s denial of shutting down studios and another screenshot of a note sent to Roll7 employees which was obtained by Bloomberg.
Hey everyone, let’s play a game called What’s The Truth?
On the left, comments from Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick to IGN today.
On the right, part of a note sent to Roll7 employees that was obtained by Bloomberg earlier this month, shared now with the source’s permission. pic.twitter.com/raRV9Q4u4G
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) May 16, 2024
“What we’ve said is, in the 8-K filing that we put out, we talked about the cost reduction plan is approximately 5% reduction in headcount worldwide, but we did not give a label-by-label breakdown of what that looks like,” a Take-Two PR said when Zelnick was asked if the report by Bloomberg was false.
When the IGN reporter insisted on getting clarification on the status of both studios, the PR said, “We have not provided any additional color beyond what I just said”.
