Niantic has made several apps since its launch, but the first game to come to mind is Pokemon Go. This 2016 game was a smash hit, and it introduced a lot of us to AR games and the concept of walking for fun. It was so popular that the portable charger market actually saw major growth.
But, things aren’t good now, as Niantic had to cut 90 jobs
A company can appear to be doing well to the general public but go through some serious financial issues behind the scenes. This is what’s happening with Niantic. In a disheartening email to its employees, Niantic stated that it needed to cut about 8% of its workforce. The CEO of the company, John Hanke, was the author of the email, and in it, he said that the cutbacks are to “further streamline our operations in order to best position the company to weather any economic storms that may lie ahead.” Basically, the economy is in a tough spot, so, in order to cut costs, it needed to cut jobs. Not only were people let go, but there were also some projects cut. The company needed to bring the ax down on four projects that it was working on. This is unfortunate, as that’s four new games from the company that we may never see. Basketball fans should be happy, as the company is not canceling NBA All-World. Niantic partnered with the NBA to create an AR basketball game that will take place in the Metaverse. As for the projects that were canceled, one was going to be a theatrical game called Hamlet. Another one was going to be a Transformers game called Heavy Metal. As for the other two, we don’t really know anything about them. However, we do know that they were going to be called Snowball and Blue sky. The economy is in a really tough spot right now, so plenty of companies are probably making the same types of cuts. Hopefully, things will eventually turn around and we’ll be able to see these games come to the market.
