Discussions with works council representing staff at three German studios underway
Ubisoft have initiated talks over voluntary redundancies at three German studios under their banner, reportedly seeking to cut around 100 workers via the move. Ubisoft Dusseldorf, Ubisoft Berlin and Ubisoft Mainz are the studios set to be affected, with talks over the plans between Ubisoft and a works council representing staff having been initiated by the publishers last week.
"In Germany, we initiated discussions with the Works Council last week regarding a proposed voluntary departure plan across Ubisoft Dusseldorf, Ubisoft Berlin & Ubisoft Mainz," a Ubisoft representative confirmed to Game File, who report that the publishers are hoping to release their headcount by around about 100 workers with this move. Ubisoft's choice to offer voluntary redundancies before potentially resorting to regular layoffs to hit their target number of departures is likely linked to German labour laws being stronger than those in countries like the US, where it's relatively easy for companies to get rid of staff at the drop of a hat.
Of the three affected studios, the one you're potentially most likely to have heard of is Ubisoft Mainz, primary developers on the Anno series. Founded in 1995 as Related Designs, their latest release is last year's Anno 117: Pax Romana. Ubisoft Dusseldorf are older, having been founded in 1988 as Blue Byte, and have spent their last few years contributing to Rainbow Six Siege and Rayman Legends Retold. Ubisoft Berlin, by far the youngest of the three studios having opened in 2018, have also been working on those two games.
In line with the Berlin studio having been founded just before the pandemic, around that time Ubisoft were kicking off a big recruiting push in Germany. "We see the potential to grow to more than 1,000 talents by the end of 2023," Ubi's German studio boss Benedikt Grindel said back then. "We have very ambitious plans for our existing and future projects and are looking for creative minds from all areas of game development."
All that talk's since morphed into endless chatter about and carrying out of mass cuts across Ubisoft's studios. Ubisoft Singapore and Trials developers Redlynx. Ubisoft Winnipeg, Belgrade, and Barcelona. Long-time Tom Clancy studio Red Storm. Ubisoft's Paris HQ. The list of studios being closed or subjected to staff cuts by the publisher has grown as this year's progressed. Changes to remote working policies have also contributed to strikes at Ubisoft studios in France and Italy.
Solidarity to all of the Ubisoft workers who've been affected by all of this upheaval.