Ubisoft Entertainment SA—Ubisoft closed studios in Winnipeg and Belgrade and refocused Barcelona solely on Rainbow Six amid a wave of cuts that shrank headcount from 20,000+ to 16,590
In September 2026 Ubisoft closed its Winnipeg (Canada) and Belgrade (Serbia) studios and narrowed its Barcelona studio to work solely on the Rainbow Six franchise, the latest in a string of cuts that included closing Ubisoft Stockholm and Ubisoft Halifax and canceling six games (including a Prince of Persia: Sands of Time remake) in January 2026, 200 Paris job cuts the same month, and 40 cuts to the Splinter Cell remake team in Toronto in February 2026, reducing total headcount from over 20,000 in 2023 to 16,590. The cuts followed CEO Yves Guillemot's January 21, 2026 announcement ending remote work and mandating a five-day in-office return without prior consultation with works councils, funded by a EUR200 million cost-cutting plan employees learned of via press release. Five Ubisoft unions called an international strike for February 10-12, 2026, with one union statement saying management was 'push[ing] us out by making our working conditions unbearable' rather than taking financial responsibility for layoffs.
Scoring Impact
| Topic | Direction | Relevance | Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tech Worker Organizing | -against | secondary | -0.50 |
| Worker Rights | -against | primary | -1.00 |
| Overall incident score = | -0.664 | ||
Score = avg(topic contributions) × significance (high ×1.5) × confidence (0.59)
Evidence (2 signals)
GameBastion: Ubisoft shuts another 2 studios amid further wave of cuts and job losses
GameBastion reported Ubisoft's September 2026 closures of its Winnipeg and Belgrade studios and the narrowing of Barcelona to Rainbow Six-only work, part of a headcount reduction from over 20,000 in 2023 to 16,590, following earlier 2026 closures of Ubisoft Stockholm and Halifax and cancellation of six games.
VGChartz: Ubisoft unions call for massive international strike over unilateral RTO mandate and cost-cutting plan
VGChartz reported that five Ubisoft unions called an international strike for February 10-12, 2026 after CEO Yves Guillemot ended remote work and mandated a five-day office return without works-council consultation, tied to a EUR200 million cost-cutting plan employees learned of via press release.