Facing an uncertain future, Disney is planning a fresh round of job cuts, this time targeting its TV division.
Disney has been struggling recently, which has included several Disney titles that were deemed box office flops in 2023—including Pixar's Elemental—declining linear TV viewership and an uneven transition into a streaming future.
The entertainment behemoth has been hemorrhaging money through its Disney+ streaming service but managed to curb losses by raising subscription costs. However, its theme parks have also been underperforming, with experts citing price hikes and increased competition as reasons for the decline in visitors post-pandemic.
Now Disney is aiming to reduce costs by eliminating approximately 140 jobs—or about 2 percent of staff—at Disney Entertainment Television, per Bloomberg UK.
Newsweek emailed a spokesperson for Disney for comment on Thursday.
According to the publication, which cited "people with knowledge of the matter" who do not want to be identified, the company's ABC stations and networks like NatGeo and Freeform would be worst hit by the changes. NatGeo will allegedly lose 13 percent of its staff.
Disney is also reportedly eliminating jobs in its marketing and publicity teams.
Since Disney CEO Bob Iger returned to the entertainment conglomerate in 2022, he has cut billions of dollars in costs at Disney and eliminated over 8,000 positions as part of a plan to eliminate $7.5 billion in annual expenses.
In January a representative for Pixar, a subsidiary of Disney, confirmed to Newsweek that the Disney-owned animation studio would be undergoing layoffs in 2024.
According to TechCrunch, staff numbers could drop from 1,300 members to under 1,000 in the next few months—up to 20 percent of Pixar's workforce—with further job losses a possibility down the line.
However, Pixar disputed those figures and said the final number of cuts would be decided by factors such as production schedules and staff requirements for future projects. The company also said the layoffs wouldn't be immediate.
Eventually, the company said approximately 175 employees, or 14 percent, would be getting layoff notices on May 21 as it scales back the development of original streaming series.
In November, Disney announced it would be slashing costs after losing almost $1 billion due to box office flops in 2023. In an earnings call, Disney CEO Bob Iger said the company would cut an additional $2 billion in expenses in 2024.
This followed a previous announcement that Disney would be slicing $5.5 billion in the coming year, along with thousands of layoffs. However, Iger said there were no further plans to cut jobs at that time.
During the call with investors in November, Iger said Disney will produce less content in 2024, with a focus on quality.
"I've always felt that quantity can be actually a negative when it comes to quality," he said. "That's exactly what happened. We lost some focus."
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