Disney Targets Twenty Percent Cost Savings With More Layoffs

Disney managers are facing targets to slash up to twenty percent in annual costs through a new wave of layoffs. Thousands of employees across TV networks and the motion picture studio are poised to be impacted. The cuts follow ongoing reductions throughout the year after Josh D'Amaro took over as CEO from Bob Iger on March eighteenth. In April, one thousand roles were eliminated, followed by several hundred in July. More recently, another one to two hundred employees in the Experiences division were pink slipped last week. Most of those latest cuts hit the Imagineering campus in Glendale. Meanwhile, the company finished a voluntary early retirement offer for longtime executives. More eligible managers opted for that package than anticipated. Disney declined to comment on the exact timing of the upcoming cuts. Sonia Coleman wrote in an August memo that involuntary staff reductions will continue into next year. Dana Walden defended the continuous downsizing at a conference last month. She pointed out that tech companies have set their sights on the Disney business. D'Amaro stated on a recent earnings call that the savings will fund new content and guest experiences. Disney's global head count stood just north of two hundred thirty thousand at the end of the last fiscal year.