Layoffs At DAZN; Around 50 To Be Made Redundant In London HQ

deadline.com:

EXCLUSIVE: Global sports streaming outfit DAZN is to make around 50 redundancies in its London headquarters, Deadline can reveal.Staff in the Hammersmith, West London HQ have been told in the past couple of hours, Deadline understands, and a four-week redundancy process has been kickstarted, with around 50 roles set to potentially be closed.The number represents around 5% of the UK workforce, most of whom work in London, and 2% of the global workforce of just over 2,500.While London is where DAZN launched, it is understood that the decision is driven by the outfit’s decision to decentralize and focus on other growth regions such as Spain, Italy and Germany.Around 50 people are conversely being hired in the Spanish office ahead of the launch of next season’s La Liga football competition and senior leaders have been sought across the growth markets in the past few months.

Even with the UK redundancies, the non-UK hirings therefore mean there could be a net hiring gain by the end of the year across the entire business.DAZN was launched in 2016 as a punchy start-up and has moved swiftly, snapping up sports rights across multiple territories and rolling out to 200 countries worldwide including the U.S., Italy, Spain, Brazil and Japan over the past few years.The company, which is run by CEO Shay Segev and counts former Disney exec Kevin Mayer as chair, now has rights in major territories to European football, Spain’s La Liga, multiple basketball leagues, eSports and tennis, amongst others.Broadcast networks’ fall lineups and schedulesNew and returning series on broadcast, cable and streamingSeries that made it or didn’t make it in 2021-22