NCSoft to set up three game studios, cut head office staff to try to bounce back (Korea)

NCSoft, a major game company, held a shareholders meeting and announced that a proposal for company division had been approved. The company will split into three independent studios for different game types, and one R&D studio.
The new companies, First Spark Games, Big Fire Games, and Rudius Games, will be involved in artificial intelligence (AI)-related projects.
The R&D entity for the new company will be NC AI. The separation will take place on February 1, 2025. NC Soft co-CEO Park Byeong-moo said, "We will split off the system integration division in the first half of 2024 to improve management efficiency.
In addition to spinning off its system integration (SI) and quality assurance (QA) divisions, the company also reduced its workforce by about 100 people by offering voluntary retirement. Including this spinoff, the company plans to continue reducing its headcount by the end of the year.
Regarding the separation in particular, he said, "There were undesirable aspects of having too many employees concentrated at the headquarters. We decided to separate the studios in order to increase the sense of tension, creativity, and spirit of challenge."
"We decided that it would be better to do this. This is also a global trend," he explained. NCSoft is offering voluntary retirements to reduce its head office workforce by more than 1,000 people by 2025, down to 3,000.
This will be the first time in 12 years that the company has offered voluntary retirement.