New York-based mass media and entertainment company Warner Bros Discovery has reportedly laid off nearly 70 workers in the HBO and HBO Max steaming service division of the entertainment conglomerate. In percentage terms, the lay-off will impact almost 14% of the entire personnel in the HBO and HBO Max divisions.
Warner Bros Discovery, which was formed after a merger between New York-based Warner Media and Discovery Inc, in April this year, is headed by David Zaslav, President and Chief Executive Officer of the company.
Reports suggest that departments such as reality, casting, and acquisitions would be most affected by the lay-offs.
New York Times stated in its report that people who handle unscripted live-action family programs would also be laid off from HBO Max.
Since the conclusion of the merger between Warner Media and Discovery Inc in April, the newly formed company is trying hard to ensure there is no overlapping in functions and positions in the company.
Warner Bros Discovery, earlier this month, announced that HBO Max service and Discovery+ would be merging to establish a single steaming service. The merger which is scheduled to happen before May 2023 is expected to have a combined global subscription base of 130 million by 2025.
With both streaming services coming together to establish a single platform, there would be overlapping in positions and jobs in the newly created service, which would ultimately result in supplementary costs for Warner Bros Discovery.
The workforce in the reality division of HBO Max is being cut down as the to-be-formed streaming service platform would be employing workers in reality programming from Discovery.
The activity of licensing films in a pay-one deal, by HBO, would also be shut down as employees from departments for such acquisitions would be laid off eventually.
Various media portals reported that shows which are currently in motion would not be cancelled as part of job cuts. Shows on HBO which are scripted would also continue as it is without being impacted by any lay-offs.
The newly announced streaming platform is expected to have a large user base and fan following, as it would contain scripted entertainment content from HBO and unscripted entertaining content from Discovery+.
Warner Bros. Discovery said earlier this week that additional information and details about the new platform would be available by the end of this year. The users of both Discovery+ and HBO are eagerly waiting for the announcement of the name of the new service. While many people hope the new name would be ‘HBO Max’ others suggest that it would be completely different.
