Report: Developer Lockwood Announces Mass Layoff, Still Under Fire For First Round Of "Unlawful" Redundancies
Lockwood Publishing, a British developer that made headlines for “unlawfully” laying off employees last year, is set to make even more of its workers redundant. This is despite workers' claims they were promised that there wouldn’t be any further job losses, as well as a $25 million investment from Tencent back in 2020.
34 roles are said to be “at risk”, although workers aren’t currently aware which jobs are affected. An employee tells TheGamer staff will be informed by the end of today if they are included in this group. During this time, they are still expected in the office, despite many feeling anxious, and even unable to sleep.
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Lockwood Publishing is best known for metaverse game Avakin Life. It owns three offices across the UK, and recently opened its Cambridge base in March of this year. Despite this, it’s now evident that its financial woes have not improved.
Both former and current employees at Lockwood have reached out to TheGamer, explaining how the company is now looking to lay off 15 percent of its workforce. The news was shared with staff during a meeting with CEO Halli Bjornsson yesterday, who blamed the need for another round of layoffs on the war in Ukraine. This point was apparently not expanded upon.
“We will be putting 34 roles at risk of redundancy, and we propose to make 29 roles redundant,” reads a Slack message shared with staff after the meeting on Thursday, sent to us by two employees. “Given the news we understand that many of you may wish to take some personal time so please do take the rest of today off.” Staff have returned to work as usual today.
According to workers, there was little to no explanation as to why
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