EA chief executive Andrew Wilson netted $25 million last financial year while the company cut five percent of its global workforce and shuttered several offices to “drive growth.”
These new financial details comes from EA’s Annual Meeting and Proxy Statement 2024 (courtesy of Game Developer) which details the company’s annual net bookings and executive compensation structure, among other things. What stands out more than anything is the $60 million bagged cumulatively by EA execs in a year plagued by staff layoffs.
Out of the EA bigwigs, Andrew Wilson was the biggest earner, followed by Laura Miele, who serves as the president of EA entertainment, technology, and central development. Miele netted $12 million last year.
These numbers stand in distressing contrast to the $148,704 compensation received by the median employee. For perspective, CEO Wilson earned 172 times more than the median EA worker. And all of this is without even counting underpaid contractors that companies like EA don’t recognize as actual employees.
The EA statement—which is already being lambasted online—praised Wilson for maintaining “a year of continued employee satisfaction scores above industry benchmarks” and effectively coordinating studio leadership to foster “franchise development and success.”
In March this year, we saw a round of layoffs in the Apex Legends development team. Ridgeline Games, headed by Marcus Lehto, was also shut down later that same month. After the shuttering, Lehto said that he “didn’t have anything positive to say about EA.”
The company laid off roughly another 670 employees in February “to optimize [EA’s] global real estate footprint to best support [its] business.”
