Following the announcement that WWE had agreed to be acquired by The Endeavor Group, with the intention of merging WWE and UFC to form a new publicly traded company, talent releases, and employee layoffs were anticipated.
Endeavor COO Mark Shapiro stated shortly after the acquisition was announced that employee layoffs would occur because Endeavor already has people in departments that can handle things at certain WWE departments.
Over 100 WWE employees were reportedly laid off in September due to overlapping. WWE also made significant talent cuts, affecting both the main roster and NXT.
Dave Meltzer recapped the TKO earnings call on Tuesday in the latest edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, noting that more cuts would be made on the corporate side.
Meltzer wrote, “The company noted that there will be a great decrease in expenses in eliminating jobs in IT, marketing, finance, human resources and legal when it comes to overlapping personnel in UFC and WWE who can do those jobs for both companies. They expect to save $50 million to $100 million, and the figure was said to be expected to be the high end of this range, with 75 percent of the savings being on the books for 2024.”
