Source: Hudson Lays Off Half of US Staff

290w ago - Next-Gen has learned that Redwood Shores-based Hudson Entertainment has laid off approximately half of its workforce.

All of the layoffs occurred within the company's mobile division this morning, according to a source who wished to remain anonymous.

"Their mobile division has not been profitable for about the last year-and-a-half or so," the source said. "They've just been having a lot of trouble getting their games onto big carriers like Verizon and Cingular. It's a very competitive market place."

He pegged Hudson Entertainment's workforce at around 50-70 people total, meaning layoffs ranged somewhere between 25 and 35.

The source said that Hudson Entertainment intended to bring original ideas to US carriers as well as port over mobile games from Japan, but those ideas were "shot down."

He said that missteps in marketing and management were also contributing factors that led to poor performance of the mobile division.

Workers laid off will receive two weeks of severance pay. Our source said that there are "lots of unhappy people" at Hudson Entertainment today.

"It seemed like it caught everyone off guard. They didn't see it coming," he said.

A call to Hudson Entertainment marketing director John Lee was unreturned as of press time.

Hudson Entertainment is the North American arm of Bomberman house Hudson Soft, which is based in Japan.