Last October, Zynga officially withdrew its gambling license application in Nevada, a move which reinforced the company’s recent shift away from real-money gambling.
In July, the company stated: “Zynga is making the focused choice not to pursue a license for real money gaming in the United States. [However] Zynga will continue to evaluate all of its priorities against the growing market opportunity in free, social gaming, including social casino offerings.”
The time to reevaluate may be drawing near once again, as the social gaming giant continues to be in need of a major comeback.
Last week, news broke that Zynga is laying off about 15 percent of its workforce, which amounts to more than 300 employees.
“This is part of a cost-reduction plan that is supposed to generate $33 million to $35 million in savings this year, excluding a $15 million to $17 million restructuring charge,” TechCrunch reports.
Since Mattrick took over the company from founding CEO Mark Pincus, Zynga has engaged in a series of layoffs, cut out middle layers of management and shut down poorly performing games. Last summer, the company let go of about 520 people, or 18 percent of its workforce.
Although entering the domestic online gambling market aggressively today may not be sufficient to turn things around for Zynga, if the real money online gambling industry gains steam in the U.S. this year and next, Zynga will be better positioned to reap rewards from this reality by already being well-established in the arena before the boom comes.
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