Capcom was hit by massive layoffs today, which even affected high members of the company like senior vice president Christian Svensson.
Capcom, who released a statement earlier, said,
“Capcom today laid off several employees from the U.S. office as part of an overall organizational restructure of the company. The transition to the new generation of hardware and changing industry landscape have required us to adapt our business to best meet our new goals. We sincerely thank each individual for their contributions and wish them well.”
Capcom employs about 130 people, and California law states that any layoffs equal to 50 people or 50 percent of the workforce must be registered. Since there have been no signs of registration, layoffs will be less than 50, although a “restructure’ will likely mean that the numbers will be in the double-digits.
Svensson volunteered to go for the planned organizational restructure. Although we aren’t sure who else from the company were affected by the layoffs, Svensson said, “sadly, I’m not the only one affected by the reorganization today. Over the next few days, I’ll be gathering resumes from as many as I can and will be sending them out to my contacts around the industry to see if there’s a ‘love connection’ to be made.”
The vice president had been at Capcom for eight years, previously serving as a games journalist. On his Facebook page he posted,
“I’ve had the opportunity to interface with the best fans any company could ever hope to have,” he wrote. “I know that I wasn’t always able to deliver what they wanted, but I promise that I did my best to champion their needs and wants. So thank you to the fans who made my job rewarding, challenging, and, if nothing else, interesting.”
Svensson was one of the best at Capcom, making an effort to talk to fans, addressing concerns about everything from DRM to sleeping franchises, like Mega Man. He will be truly missed.
“While I wish the company the best of luck, Capcom is going in a different direction and the need for people at my level, relative to other areas, is lacking,” he added. “Those who know me well, know that I’ve been ready to go for quite some time. We tried some things that worked. We tried others that didn’t. We fought fights that were worth fighting and even won a few. I’m proud of what we accomplished.“
