Faced with a revenue slowdown and budget tightening, Warner Bros. Ent. plans to layoff 400 employees companywide in Burbank, 250 of which were notified on Wednesday, VARIETY reports. There are currently 4,550 employed at the Burbank studio.
Each of the studios four divisions is affected: Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Home Ent. Group, Warner Bros. Television Group and Warner Bros. Consumer Products in addition to the studios new specialty division, Warner Independent Pictures, which was slashed by 10%, including production head Michael Andreen.
In addition, the studio is being streamlined by combining all TV operations under a single banner and merging home entertainment and digital operations.
In a prepared statement, Warner Bros. Ent said, "We had to take some difficult measures to position the company for the future. We acknowledge that these decisions have affected people's livelihoods and to that end, we examined every aspect of our business in order to cut costs responsibly and to keep staff reductions to a minimum."
Bill Desowitz, former editor of VFXWorld, is currently the Crafts Editor of IndieWire.
