Unity say layoffs “likely” as they recover from disastrous pricing plan rollout and look to AI for growth
Unity have said that they expect to lay off staff in the coming months, following the engine maker’s catastrophic rollout of their new pricing plan earlier this year and as they turn towards a more “focused” offering, including the likes of AI, for growth.
In their latest Q3 earnings report (via The Verge), Unity acknowledged the disastrous introduction of their proposed runtime fee announced in September, which was ripped to shreds by devs for its suggestion of charging them every time a player installs a game.
Amid widespread criticism, big-name devs quickly announced plans to move away from Unity as a result, prompting an apology from Unity that promised changes - including dropping the fee for devs using Unity Personal and those who don’t upgrade to the newest 2024 release of their Pro and Enterprise, meaning older games would be exempt. The changes also include allowing devs to self-report their install numbers - rather than relying on “estimates” feared to be open to fraud or manipulation by bad actors - and the option to instead pay a set 2.5% revenue share.
“At the end of September, we introduced runtime fees on the Editor to complement our seat-based subscriptions, a critical step to make Create a sustainable business,” said Jim Whitehurst, Unity’s interim CEO following the resignation of long-term chief John Riccitello last month, in the earnings report. “While we did not expect the introduction of the fees to be easy, the execution created friction with our customers and near-term headwinds. We expect the impact of this business model change to have minimal benefit in 2024 and ramp from there as customers adopt our new releases.”
The report revealed that Unity’s Q3 results had been “mixed”, falling
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