| IcaroRibeiro said:
There is no limited amount of workforce in gaming business. There is no shortages of developers either. There is an excess of gaming dev students who just don't get jobs and have to pursue other engineering careers. Microsoft do not hire them because it's take some time to train. It's not like Microsoft lacks senior designers, they have enough to train new generations of designers and developers with the available entry level workforce. They simply don't bother because it's faster is most cost effective to just buy studios. Edit: And by cost effective I do not mean buying studios is cheaper. With the money MS is paying for Blizzard they could have hired every single employee on Blizzard and keep them working for 30 years with wages of over 300k USD a year. Pretty sure they could have just hired some dozens of senior devs for less than 1% of what they are offering Blizzard By cost effective I mean their buying spree will have an actual pay off, because they are acquiring IPs and games that are very well stabilished. The workforce they will get is just the cherry on top, but ultimately hiring issues are by no means a reason behind acquisitions, as they could have solve ANY kind of staff deficit with much lesser investments |
There is no limited amount of workforce in gaming business. There is no shortages of developers either. There is an excess of gaming dev students who just don't get jobs and have to pursue other engineering careers.
Their is actually a shortages of developers, in as been this way for over 20 years, that's why it's incredibly easy for an IT students to find a job right out of school. And the main reasons that students under a game dev program choose other career is not for the lack of options in gaming, it's because software development in generally have higher wage and way better working condition. (who does not like a better salary, better working hours and paid overtime with bonus)
Microsoft do not hire them because it's take some time to train. It's not like Microsoft lacks senior designers, they have enough to train new generations of designers and developers with the available entry level workforce. They simply don't bother because it's faster is most cost effective to just buy studios.
Not exactly, MS does not shy away from training new devs, they just are already maximizing this avenue since 2018 (with the exception of 2022 were they stopped all hiring company wide). In that timeframe many of their studios doubled and some tripled in size. Buying studios is not cost effective, it's pretty much the opposite but it's the only realist option to gain higher velocity toward achieving your goal with the benefits of limiting risk associated with your investment. Many view this $70B amount and think they should have just spend this amount on expanding organically, it's simply not possible especially since it's already covered by other investment. This $70B investment main goal is to solve their shortcomings short terms spending this amount over 15-20 years won't do it.
And by cost effective I do not mean buying studios is cheaper. With the money MS is paying for Blizzard they could have hired every single employee on Blizzard and keep them working for 30 years with wages of over 300k USD a year. Pretty sure they could have just hired some dozens of senior devs for less than 1% of what they are offering Blizzard
More like 200K over 30 years but anyway, that's the problem they don't sign a 1 time $70B check to be the equivalent of $2.33B/years over 30 years, they invested that amount specifically to reap the benefits short term and accelerate GamePass growth. it's not that they are not interested in organic growth, they are already doing so, it's just not fast enough to get GamePass and Xbox where they want them to be in the timeframe they want them to be.
