TVB Lays Off 150 Employees
TVB will be undergoing another huge staff layoff. After downsizing its sports, voice acting, MyTV Super, and TVB 8 departments, TVB confirmed on the afternoon of October 5th that it will continue to lay off more employees in the coming future.
According to the report, TVB is set to lay off the staff who previously worked for TVB Weekly magazine, which has already stopped printing. Studio #16 will also be shut down, and it would instead be leased out to other production companies for filming. This totals 150 employees.
TVB confirmed the news through a statement, “In response to the changing business environment, Television Broadcasts Limited (TVB) has always been in the process of following these changes to improve efficiency and pursue new business projects. The prints of TVB Weekly have already been taken over by online versions, and in order to meet the expectations of filming at real locations rather than in studio, [TVB] will close one of its filming studios.”
The statement continued, “[TVB] has decided to cut down the departments in charge of TVB Weekly, production planning, art design, and non-drama production, totaling about 150 employees. Effective immediately.”
A TVB spokesperson added, “Having to reduce staff will always be a tough decision. Nonetheless, it is clear that we need to catch up to the changes of the business environment. We will continue to invest more to increase the production value of our projects.”
According to a source, TVB executives had a hand in picking which staff to let go. A producer worker in the variety department has already received his letter. There was also news that Au Yiu-hing (歐耀興), producer of The Tofu War <燦爛的外母> and Birth of a Hero <翻生武林>, has been demoted to director. In an interview with HK01, the producer said he hasn’t received noticed of the demotion.
“I’m working right now,” he said. “We’ll talk about this later.”
Source: HK01.com
This article is written by Addy for JayneStars.com.
TVB is banking so much profit, yet still lays off 150 employees. I hope this company falls and goes out of business.
@anon at this rate it will soon
@anon Nah, they won’t go out of business….they can just rebrand themselves and become CCTVB, lol.
In all seriousness though – I agree with you….TVB keeps complaining year after year that advertising revenue has gone down and while that is true, they are still able to bank a hefty profit quarter after quarter. And like I said before, TVB is going about this the wrong way – yes, they need to fix the issues that run deep within their company, but the answer isn’t to lay off people so they can save money by not having to pay those people’s salaries. If anything, they need to take care of their people and treat them better because at the end of the day, the fate of the company is in their employees’ hands.
@llwy12 Yeah, I have no idea who is managing TVB right now, but they are doing a very poor job. Stingy and greedy employers…
@peachyogurt Yup…the current management is running TVB into the ground (though I guess technically they’ve been doing that for at least 15 years already, given that TVB was already in decline years ago).
Basically what TVB is trying to tell us is this: hey audiences, you want us to focus on production values like real location filming and better scripts and such — sure, but the only way we will be able to do that is to fire a bunch of people so we can take the money we were going to pay their salaries with and use it for this…if we don’t do this, the only other alternative is for you all to continue to endure crappy productions….sorry!
For TVB, especially under Mark Lee’s leadership, pretty much the answer to all their problems is to “cut, cut, and cut some more!”
This is actually old news. Back in August, TVB’s CEO Mark Lee already said that they would be laying off an additional 200 people (approximately 5%) by the end of the year – this was on top of the 10% reduction in staff (roughly 430 people) they already did throughout this year. So by the end of 2018, more than 600 people will have been laid off. Basically, most of the “reductions” and “shutting down” that they are doing now is stuff they already talked about a few months ago, so no one should be surprised, to be honest.
I hope ViuTV hires them all.
I can’t believe that they are laying off staff when they are seriously falling behind industry standards in small screen production. Their studio lighting makes me cringe when all they can do is wash out everything to make it look like there’s sunlight.
Wow. First atv now this happened? If they want to save money then stop making a boring drama that way don’t have to waste money or stop hired people who can’t really act.
I feel.sorry for the staff who were laid off. I hope they get redundancy packages. 🙁
I do not know why TVB is doing so poorly. I do think the social media, internet and artificial intelligence have changed many traditional jobs. Those who do routine work will be made redundant as software and machines replace these work.
Choice is immense and cheap. Netflix, Stan etc etc. People choose what they wish to watch. To survive, I think, creativity and adaptability are the keys. TVB may have found out the changes too late. When you dominate the Asian dramas for too long, one may become complacent. Never too late to adapt but for those staff caught in the restructure, it is bitter pill.