Less than two weeks after we shared that BuzzFeed News and Paper Magazine would be shutting down due to ad revenue loss, it is now reported that MTV News is following suit as Paramount Global cuts 25 percent of its U.S. workforce due to consolidation.
RELATED: BuzzFeed News & Paper Magazine Shut Down Due to Ad Revenue Loss
MTV News Shutting Down After 36 Years As Paramount Cuts 25% Of Its U.S. Workforce
According to several reports published on Tuesday (May 9), media company Paramount Global is gearing up to reduce its costs and consolidate its teams. Subsequently, the company has decided to let go of 25 percent of its staff across SHOWTIME, MTV Entertainment Studios and Paramount Media Networks.
The news arrives months after internal deliberations and integration as SHOWTIME rebrands itself into Paramount+ With SHOWTIME. Also affected is MTV News — the news production division of MTV first launched in the late 1980s
It is noted that MTV News had previously been hit with a massive wave of layoffs within the last six years. However, due to the latest round of cuts, MTV News is officially shutting down after 36 years.
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A memo was sent out to all staff by Chris McCarthy, the President and CEO at SHOWTIME/MTV Entertainment Studios and Paramount Media Networks.
McCarthy in-part said, “[Despite Paramount’s] success in streaming, we continue to feel pressure from broader economic headwinds like many of our peers. Senior leaders in coordination with HR have been working together over the past few months to determine the optimal organization for the current and future needs of our business.”
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McCarthy revealed, “As a result, we have made the very hard but necessary decision to reduce our domestic team by approximately 25%.”
He explained, “This is a tough yet important strategic realignment of our group. Through the elimination of some units and by streamlining others, we will be able to reduce costs and create a more effective approach to our business as we move forward. Today we will notify employees whose positions are being impacted with leaders communicating the news directly to those teams/or individuals. These meetings will be followed by individual 1:1s with our HR partners.”
It is also reported that the three groups that McCarthy oversees: SHOWTIME/MTV Entertainment Studios and Paramount Media Networks, will be consolidated into “two functions.”
1) Studios – integrating SHOWTIME and MTV Entertainment Studios into one studio team.
2) Networks – which will combine nine separate teams into one portfolio group.
It is added that all affected Paramount-owned networks include: MTV, Comedy Central, Paramount Network, Nick, CMT, TV Land, Logo, Pop TV, and Smithsonian.
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