A few dozen CNN Digital employees will see their jobs cut this week as part of a broader restructuring and reorganization of several departments, including video and production. Some of those employees will ultimately fill newly created positions, but a few dozen will be forced to leave the company.
The cuts were described by an individual familiar with the situation as “a mixture of consolidation and cost-savings.”
The changes were slated to be announced at an employee town hall meeting, but were first reported on Monday by Vanity Fair. The cuts are expected to happen later in the week.
The total number of employees affected is still changing but will be less than 50, according to an individual familiar with the situation.
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“Not every new project has paid off so we will stop some activities in order to reallocate those resources and enable future experimentation,” a CNN spokesman said in a statement. “Organizations that do not make big bets and continuously evolve are the ones that fail.”
CNN has more than 600 digital employees worldwide, so the total share of employees affected by this week’s cuts will be a few points under 10 percent.
Over the last few months, CNN has shut down Casey Neistat’s video company Beme and ended the network’s daily Snapchat show after just four months. Earlier this month, BuzzFeed reported that CNN laid off a few technical staffers who worked on the CNN MoneyStream app, which will become an automated feed.
CNN’s broader digital picture is still positive. While the digital division came in $20 million under revenue targets for 2017, it is still profitable, generating $370 million in digital revenue last year. Back in September, when the estimated revenue miss was first reported, a network spokesman said “there are no plans for freezes, cutbacks or layoffs of any kind.”
