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Disney starts second round of layoffs in $5.5 billion cost-cutting plan

By Nithya Bose in US business news, posted April 25, 2023

Disney has started its second and biggest round of layoffs as part of its plans to shrink its workforce by 7,000.

The cuts will hit various departments, including Disney Entertainment and ESPN, as well as Disney Parks, Experiences and Products.

In first-quarter earnings, CEO Bob Iger disclosed the wider reorganization that will trim costs by $5.5 billion.

The cuts will be announced by Thursday, April 26, bringing the total number of eliminated roles to 4,000.

The layoffs are not expected to impact the frontline hourly workers at its parks and resorts, as it is management teams that are being targeted.

Removing 7,000 positions represents almost three percent of the nearly 220,000 workforce as of October 1 last year.

Disney first told staff of a first series of layoffs on March 27.

This saw the company slash its metaverse strategies team members and also part of its Beijing office.

Alan Bergman and Dana Walden, co-chairmen of Disney Entertainment, said: “The senior leadership teams have been working diligently to define our future organization, and our biggest priority has been getting this right, rather than getting it done fast.”

A source said ESPN cuts will total 100 jobs, initially axing off-camera staffers in the three rounds of cuts.

They added ESPN will do another talent evaluation over the summer.

This will result in further downsizing and non-renewals of contracts.

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Disney said will begin the third batch of cuts by the end of the summer to meet its 7,000-person target.

Earlier this year, Iger said that Disney would curtail $3 billion in content spending, excluding sports, and the remaining $2.5 billion in noncontent costs.

Disney executives said about $1 billion in cost-cutting had already been done since the last quarter.

Disney's efforts to cut costs come when media firms are scaling back their spending, especially on content to make their streaming businesses successful.

Source: CNBC

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