Report: Namco Bandai To Lay Off 90 U.S. Staff In Re-Org

Namco Bandai is set to lay off 90 employees in the U.S. as part of a re-organization in which the company is combining its separate mobile and online game businesses into a single division, according to a report from VentureBeat. The report claims that, in addition to the merger between Namco Bandai and Namco Networks in North America, the company has decided to move a large number of game projects from its San Jose, Calif.-based office back to Japan. Carlson Choi, Namco-Bandai’s vice president of marketing, confirmed to VentureBeat that the company would be laying off an unspecified amount of staff -- and that the cuts were made because there wasn’t an exact match between the company’s needs and the skills of the employees available. "We are partnering with external development studios out there because that is where the game business is going," he said. "Our goal is to move into digital games and broaden to different platforms. The details are being sorted out now." In August the company announced losses of 1.6 billion yen ($18.7 million) for the first quarter of 2010. Following that news, the Tekken and Ridge Racer creator said it would explore a diverse range of platforms incorporating mobile and digital to increase its agility and improve its performance.