CNN is set to announce widespread cuts to its worldwide staff as part of a company-wide restructuring that will include a new streaming service, CEO Mark Thompson has revealed.
The company will slash the jobs of 6% of its staff in a cost-saving measure, with roughly 200 employees seeing their time end with the company. It does not appear as if many, if any, on-air employees will be laid off in this round of cuts. The reductions are most likely to affect producers, technicians, and editors.
“The changes we’re announcing today are part of an ongoing response by this great news organization to profound and irreversible shifts in the way audiences in America and around the world consume news,” Thompson wrote.
Thompson added that while the roughly 200 jobs will be cut today, the company doesn’t “expect total headcount to fall much this year, if at all” due to the investment of $70 million into digital plans that will be enacted throughout the calendar year.
Additionally, the network plans a new streaming service that will “develop a new way for digital subscribers at home and abroad to stream news programming from us on any device they choose,” Thompson wrote. “It’s early days but we’ve already established that there’s immense demand for it not just in America but across much of the world.”
Thompson added that CNN will “continue to have a strong presence on Max,” the Warner Bros. Discovery streaming platform, “but we also believe it is not a complete answer to the future of the great linear CNN experience.”
The network is also slated to debut a “fresh new TV schedule” on Thursday. Previous reporting has shared that CNN would move Wolf Blitzer to late mornings, away from the afternoon timeslot he has held for 20 years, while Jim Acosta would find himself anchoring a new program from Midnight to 2 AM ET. That shift for Acosta was viewed as a way to “throw a bone” to new President Donald Trump, as Acosta has been one of the loudest and most ardent critics of the Republican president.
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