Employee’s of NBC Universal are probably feeling as if they are sitting on thin ice, as the media conglomerate made yet another round of belt-tightening on Monday morning. NBC laid off a small number of employee’s across all of its cable entertainment networks, and while the cuts were argued to be minor its estimated that nearly 450 people are now out of work.
The news comes after the “Tonight Show with Jay Leno” laid off 20 staffers and had Leno take a pay cut to keep the show profitable and on the air. Today’s cuts included staffers, producers and others who worked for USA Network, E!, Bravo, MSNBC, Syfy, and G4.
G4 recently announced that both “Attack of the Show” and “X-Play,” two popular programs that have been a mainstay on the network have been canceled. Analysts believe that the creative arm of the company, NBC Entertainment, was not affected by this round of layoffs. The layoffs were made after the corporate side of the company asked each business unit to determine where cuts could be made–mostly eliminating duplicate jobs and other inefficiencies.
The company continues to try and shore-up their budget and while more cuts are not currently planned, many are starting to feel the heat that their jobs could be in jeopardy. As previously mentioned, 20 staffers from “The Tonight Show” were cut in August and then another 25 employee’s were recently removed from the Universal Pictures film making arm of the company. Now an additional 450 company employees will be looking for work in the television industry.
