Further confirmation that the video game industry is immune to the woes of other industry's during this recession has appeared in the form of Ubisoft seeking 900 new employee's. This wonderful piece of news was thrown into my lap by GameIndustry.biz, from which I have obtained the quotes to follow.
Breaking it down by the numbers, 500 recruits will go to Ubisofts newly established studios in Singapore, India and China While another 400 staff are added to the already successful and well established offices in Canada, Romania and once again, china.
"We have a dual priority of ramping up as quickly as possible in our newly created studios while also growing and keeping our leading position in our established studios," said Elham Mottahed-Asdaghi, communications manager for Ubisoft International Production Studios.
"We feel that the industry is relatively immune to the slowdown and we're not expecting that to change in the near future.
In the article two things stand out to me, the fact that the talent pool which depends on the education system was such a key factor and that in the case of Singapore, strong government made the difference for the upwards of 300 people who will be employed at the Ubisoft Studio.
"We've specifically chosen to establish teams in regions where there is a great system of education and therefore a continually refreshing pool of talent," he detailed.
"In our established studios, we were the pioneers in the region but our success has attracted competitors and so the competition for talent is tougher - but we work hard to ensure that we are attracting the best talent."
America is filled with thousands if not millions of young talented artists,programmers and designers who would gladly work for ubisoft but if ubisoft's lack of expansion in the US is due to a lack of quality education and despite the efforts of states like Georgia and Texas, lack of strong government backing for incentives to open up studio's here.
Meanwhile, Gameloft's Indian studio plans to increase headcount from 120 to 500 over twelve months after Ubisoft acquired them this year.
As for the expansion in china, last year Ubisoft opened a studio in that country with the intention to ramp up staff numbers from 10 to 200 within 12 months.
Mottahed-Asdaghi believes the combination of solid publishing credentials with creative and multicultural expression makes the firm an attractive prospect to recruits.
"We can offer a unique opportunity for international mobility, since we have dynamic studios in 19 different locations. Our corporate culture is to share our knowledge and our different cultural points of view in order to enrich our experience and therefore offer games that offer unique playing opportunities," he said.
"We encourage international exchange and creative freedom across the board. On the other hand, we are the second largest creative team in the world so our team members have access to solid publisher resources.
"In a way, we offer the best of both worlds - solid enterprise resources with a small developer, creative atmosphere," he added.
While Ubisoft is clearly an international not to mention FRENCH developer and publisher, its expansion is thanks in no small part to successful sales of its splinter cell and Prince of Persia series here in the US. The more recent smash hits that have been Assassins Creed and the soon to be Real Time Strategy game for the console, Endwar are only going to drive up revenue for the company but once again due largely to the US video game market being all but invincible to the recession we currently find ourselves in.
Read the GameIndustry.biz article here
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