Wētā FX hoping to rehire some of the laid-off staff

Unity are chopping 265 jobs - around 3.8% of their global workforce - and ending an agreement with digital effects company Wētā FX as part of a company “reset”, following an awful year for the game engine provider. Unity also plan to close offices in 14 locations, including Singapore and Berlin, and cut costs at offices in San Francisco and Bellevue, Washington.

First reported byReuters, the termination of the Wētā FX agreement will take effect on 10th December, and “comes as Unity refocus their efforts on their core business”, according to a Wētā FX statement picked up byFXGuide.

At the time, Unitydescribedthe move as a bid “to empower the growing number of game developers, artists, and potentially millions of consumer creators with highly sophisticated content creation tools”. As part of the acquisition, the company also took on 275 Wētā Digital engineers.

The remainder of Wētā Digital formed a standalone entity, Wētā FX. Unity subsequently struck a professional services agreement with Wētā FX - the same agreement that will come to an end this December.

Unity have not had a great year, to put it mildly. The companyintroduced a new pricing structure in Septemberthat would see them charging Unity developers per game install given certain conditions, based oninstall number estimates provided by Unity themselves. Developerswere not very keen on this, leading Unity toapologise and tweak their policy, without making a full reversal.

The companyrevealed “mixed” financial results in their last earnings report in early November, and announced that they expected to lay off staff, with Jim Whitehurst, Unity’s interim CEO following the resignation of John Riccitello, commenting that “while we did not expect the introduction of the [new runtime pricing policy] to be easy, the execution created friction with our customers and near-term headwinds”. According to Wētā FX, Unity approached them about ending the services agreement on 26th October.

“Unity’s need to refocus its efforts on its core business, and change in its relationship with Wētā FX was not something we had planned for,” reads the statement from Wētā FX. “We are endeavoring to hire back as many crew as we can, however, there may be a few roles that we may not be able to accommodate within our new structure. Both Unity and Wētā FX will be offering support to those affected.”

Elsewhere in the statement, Wētā FX offered their own rationale for the decisions. “Unity believes the Wētā Digital team are remarkable, but Unity needs to become leaner as it focuses its expertise on its core business,” the statement explains. “It also believes it makes more sense for Wētā FX to own full end-to-end production activities directly. Unity will be focusing its expertise and people on other matters, and Wētā FX will be getting support for its use of the Wētā Tools directly from its own crew - a shorter path which makes sense for both companies.”

What a year it’s been. Best of luck to all affected.