Angry Birds maker Rovio plans layoffs in restructuring

The mobile game studio revealed cuts to 260 workers, as it transitions to a smaller, more profitable company.

Rovio says it will be focusing on just three core areas from now on: consumer products, games and media.

Rovio said the job reductions will apply across the entire organization – excluding those working on the production of the the “Angry Birds” movie in the U.S. and Canada with Sony Pictures.

Over the past several years, the Finnish company has pushed itself to do “too many things” in its eagerness to grow and capitalize on its wildly successful Angry Birds franchise. Rantala was optimistic about the performance of the company’s latest game Angry Birds 2, pointing to 50m downloads in its first month after release. With efforts in merchandise, amusement parks and cartoons among other things, it’s but obvious that there’s an attempt to go back to its roots and focus on what’s central to the company.

Reuters reports that Rovio Entertainment Ltd. has failed to create new hit games since the 2009 launch of Angry Birds, the number one paid mobile app of all time.

Angry Birds 2 is performing well, but Rovio still needs to cut its workforce.

“This is personally a hard decision”, he continued.

That animation movie (based on… you guessed it, Angry Birds) is set to be released in May of 2016.

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Rovio’s difficulties were caused by its poor profitability in recent years, largely due to a setback in its peripheral business. The company’s “consumer products” category saw revenue fall from 73.1 million euros ($83.4 million) in 2013 to 41.4 million in 2014. “It is a gloomy near future for the company, but restructuring makes them more agile and could provide new success stories”.