Xbox boss shares her vision: mass layoffs meet megalomania
Closed studios, thousands of layoffs and a completely utopian goal: Microsoft’s Xbox division should “entertain a billion people” every day. New gaming CEO Asha Sharma’s massive undertaking is met with a lot of skepticism.
Reconstruction at Xbox and big goals
The Xbox division is currently undergoing the largest restructuring in its history. CEO Asha Sharma announced that she would cut around 3,200 jobs by 2027 and divest from several development studios. At the same time, the manager formulated the ambitious goal of entertaining more than a billion people every day in the future.
According to its own information, the company currently reaches around 500 million monthly users across all platforms. In order to meet the new requirement, not only would this have to double, but every single user would also have to log in daily. For comparison: Steam as a PC platform has so far reported 41 million simultaneous users and big names like Fortnite have up to 45 million players a day with in-game events.
I want XBOX to be among the few companies that entertain more than a billion people every day, giving everyone the opportunity to create and connect. I know we can achieve this goal. XBOX has many of the most popular franchises in entertainment history, as well as talented studios around the world, and we will return to growth in 2027. Asha Sharma, Xbox CEO
Reality of player numbers
One possible route to higher numbers is through the smartphone market. The King development studio, which also belongs to the group, is responsible for the popular puzzle game Candy Crush. The application has been downloaded over three billion times and generates enormous revenue. Nevertheless, the title has an estimated 100 million daily users. This corresponds to only a tenth of the target. In order to break the one billion mark, large parts of the world’s population would have to be reached.
There are currently around 3.2 billion video gamers around the world, many of whom only occasionally play on their smartphones. The company would therefore have to bind almost a third of all global players to its services every day. Given the layoffs, observers see this as difficult.
Focus on profitable growth
The massive job cuts are officially justified by insufficient profit margins. The acquisitions of the past few years, such as the takeover of Activision Blizzard for almost 69 billion dollars (around 60 billion euros), have not yet produced the expected return. The downsizing is intended to reduce costs and focus resources on profitable brands. Numerous developers have to leave. One possible explanation for the high target is the broad interpretation of the term “entertainment”.
If users consume external streaming services such as Netflix or YouTube via their console, they could also be included in the internal statistics. The integration of cloud gaming into smart TVs also plays a role. However, it remains questionable how a shrinking workforce will cope with growth.
