Electronic Arts has reportedly laid off more than 200 quality assurance testers at its Baton Rouge office in Lousiana.
This news comes by way of Kotaku, which reports that EA laid off these workers, who worked primarily on the publisher’s battle royale Apex Legends, during a surprise Zoom call yesterday. The publication reports that its three sources were able to confirm the news, which began making rounds on Twitter when both current and former QA testers at the Lousiana office began to share what they had learned.
EA just fired its entire Baton Rouge studio, which is essentially their entire Apex Legends QA staff.
— Ben (@TopMarx420) February 28, 2023
Kotaku reports that around 8 a.m. CT, QA testers were invited to an unscheduled but mandatory Zoom call with Magnit Global, which is the contract agency that manages the workers. It was during this meeting that the entire QA team at the Lousiana office was “disbanded,” according to Kotaku.
The publication reached out to EA looking for a response to the mass layoffs, but the publisher opted not to directly address it, instead stating that as “part of its ongoing global strategy, we are expanding the distribution of our Apex Legends testing team and ending execution that’s been concentrated in Baton Rouge, Lousiana, impacting services provided by our third-party provider.” Be sure to check out Kotaku’s write-up for the full statement from EA and additional context surrounding the layoffs, the Lousiana office, and more.
[Source: Kotaku]
