Epic's 2019 P&L was published as part of Epic v. Apple. According to that:

* Fortnight revenue was $5.5B in 2018 and $3.8B in 2019

* Employee counts in those years: 1063 and 1932

* Average "People" cost per employee: $141K, $142K (CPI adjusted is $182K in 2026).

* Average "Production & Hosting" cost per employee: $189K, $150K (CPI $248K, $194K)

* Platform royalty expenses were 25% of total game revenue

* Slightly under half their Operating Expenses were people

* Fortnight was >90% of revenue

I have a strong guess that "People" costs doesn't include all salaries, and that many employees are categorized under "Production & Hosting", although I expect that also includes other costs. I'll guess 75% is people, which makes total CPI adjusted average cost per employee somewhere around $320K-$370K, but I'll say $320K.

This means 5000 employees cost around $1.6B and cutting 1000 saved around $320M/year in addition to $500M of other costs.

Most estimates of Fortnight revenue claim it's roughly flat or falling between 2020 and 2025 fluctuating between $3B and $6B.

Unless Unreal Engine or EGS revenue took off, it's kind of weird to quadruple headcount while keeping revenue basically flat or falling. If fortnight only makes $2B next year, then they would be underwater on just royalties and salaries.

https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/20696836/epic-apple-t...