For Tim Sweeney’s crusade against Apple/Google.
It’s been about 16 months since Epic Games laid off 16% of its staff, divested in Bandcamp, and spun off most of SuperAwesome into its own entity. This was done, as we were told, because Epic was “spending way more money than we earn” and while not mentioning it directly, the lawsuits against Google and Apple were certainly a part of that expenditure.
For a while now, we’ve been spending way more money than we earn, investing in the next evolution of Epic and growing Fortnite as a metaverse-inspired ecosystem for creators. I had long been optimistic that we could power through this transition without layoffs, but in retrospect I see that this was unrealistic.
So after throwing nearly one fifth of the company into the furnace, what are Epic CEO Tim Sweeney’s plans to keep the company afloat? He’s going to burn even more resources on his crusade against Apple and Google and throw the company into a potential financial crisis again.
The focus of Epic’s plan to destabilize its employee’s livelihoods and burn tons and tons of cash is on Apple’s Core Technology Fee, where developers must pay Apple a fifty cent fee for each install after the company’s first 1 million installs, if the developer wants to launch their game outside the app store. I’m assuming this is EU-centric where Apple was forced to allow sideloading of third party stores.
Epic announced that it will cover ETF charges for developers for the first twelve months if they agree to put their games on the mobile Epic Games Store.
Tim Sweeney said in an interview attended by Eurogamer;
“We might run into serious financial problems after a couple more decades of this, but we’re determined to fight this out. I expect large parts of this struggle will go on over the rest of decade, and we’re fully committed to it and breaking through.”
I can’t imagine Tim is too worried about Epic burning through money. After all, at the end of the day it’s the employees getting laid off who will pay the price for this crusade. Tim can’t exactly be fired because he’s the majority shareholder.
Sweeney, who is worth an estimated $5.7 billion, doesn’t seem willing to put any of his personal wealth on the line for this, although he could likely personally cover any losses due to this initiative for the rest of his life and still never have to worry about not being a billionaire.
But we know that’s never going to happen. Otherwise I have no opinion on the matter.
MMO Fallout 