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Garena laying off hundreds

Free Fire developer reportedly shedding 15% of Shanghai staff amid parent company downsizing

Garena is laying off hundreds of people in its Shanghai offices, sources have told Reuters.

The Free Fire developer is just one of a number of business units that parent company Sea Ltd. is making cuts to after it posted $931 million in quarterly losses last month.

The Garena cuts are said to represent 15% of the staff in Shanghai. Alongside the job losses, multiple new games have been shelved.

A Sea spokesperson confirmed for the outfit that Garena "has made some adjustments to certain teams."

Sea has reported digital entertainment bookings down 27% and 40% for the first two quarters of the year, respectively.

Beyond the early pandemic boost fading as it has for many game publishers, Garena has also seen Free Fire being banned in India alongside numerous apps with links to China. (While Sea is based in Singapore, Tencent has a stake of almost 19% in the company.)

Reuters has also reported previously that Garena laid off staff at its livestreaming game site Booyah in recent weeks.

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Brendan Sinclair

Managing Editor

Brendan joined GamesIndustry.biz in 2012. Based in Toronto, Ontario, he was previously senior news editor at GameSpot in the US.