Just a few months after a series of layoffs that resulted in almost 2,000 job cuts at Xbox so far, the CEO of the division, Asha Sharma, has reportedly spoken to the remaining employees about the company’s future. According to Windows Central, Sharma spoke during a recent town hall meeting where she also discussed the idea that Xbox can’t just rely on a few massive franchises for its business.
“On content, I think this is probably the thing that you are all seeing the most about as we’re making a lot of changes.”
She went on to speak about how the bigger franchises will still serve as anchors for Xbox as a whole, and how the company wants to turn them into “great global billion-dollar franchises”. At the same time, Xbox also wants studios to work on new IP that can be further built out over the course of time.
“We’re backing our strongest franchises. I want our great games to become great global billion-dollar franchises. I would also like to see us continue to create enduring new IP. We will not survive if we only revive on the past. We have to find new ways, and courage, to have invention on new IP that reaches new sets of audiences.”
During another recent town hall meeting, Sharma spoke about how the company has started to slowly recover from what she referred to as a “freefall”. She noted that “we’ve started to return to growth, more than 2 to 3 times what we were, and we expect to continue.
She also spoke about the future of hardware at Xbox, referring to Project Helix as “Gen-10” and referring to the line-up as a “family of devices”. While she didn’t seem to have offered more details, she did hint at the idea that Microsoft might potentially go for multiple Xbox SKUs again. However, whether this will end up being a repeat of the current generation’s Series X and S divide, or if it will lead to a further expansion of the company’s efforts in the handheld market remains to be seen.
“We are moving to a family of devices for Gen-10. There is not one device that fits all. We will certainly have a great console first, but we also know that many players will be on the go. There are some things that we are the best in the world to manufacture, and there are other things that we will partner on. So, we will be sharing more about that as our plans develop. The operating system is starting to look really good. We’re very excited about this.”
The line about Project Helix being a “family of devices” was also discussed by Sharma during another interview, where she stressed the company’s need to “innovate on affordability” in light of recent hardware shortages leading to massive price hikes across the board. What kinds of innovations she is talking about will likely be revealed as we get closer to Microsoft officially unveiling Project Helix along with its plans for how to price the console.
