Condé Nast Laying Off 5% Of Its Workforce, Citing “Volatile” Nature Of Digital Video Marketplace
01.11.2023 - 15:24
/ deadline.com
Condé Nast plans to cut 5% of its workforce, acknowledging the toll of digital video’s shift toward short-form fare inspired by TikTok.
The parent company of well-established media brands like Vanity Fair, GQ and The New Yorker will cut about 270 employees from its global ranks of about 5,400. CEO Roger Lynch informed staffers about the cutbacks this morning in a memo. (Read it below.)
Condé Nast Entertainment remains active in funneling a number of projects to streaming services, movie studios and TV and podcast networks. Agnes Chu exited as head of CNE last month in a restructuring, but the company still has about 70 projects in development and 10 in active production.
Digital video is beset by challenges, however, as Lynch acknowledged in his memo. “This year in particular, video has been a volatile area of the industry as audiences move to places like TikTok and YouTube Shorts (up 600% over the last two years alone),” he wrote. “Social video has helped drive overall video audience growth (we expect to exceed 20B video views this year, significantly beating our target); however, these new video formats haven’t found monetization models yet.”
Like other traditional publishers, Condé Nast has been managing through ongoing declines in print circulation and advertising and looking for new horizons online. Times have turned difficult for many sellers of digital ads in recent months, though the current quarterly results have shown marked improvement at bellwether companies like Meta and Alphabet.
Lynch, whose background includes executive stints at Pandora and Sling TV, became CEO of Condé Nast in 2019, tasked with overhauling the company for the digital age.
Here is Lynch’s full memo:
Dear all,
I’m writing to share an