Mad Catz sheds one third of staff

Producer of off-the-wall peripherals Mad Catz will be laying off a third of its staff in the course of the next twelve months after a disappointing financial year. Top execs, including president and CEO Darren Richardson, have already resigned.

The redundancies are being made in a bid to save $5 million a year from April 1 despite Mad Catz reporting record sales in the three months leading up to January (up 114%, in fact). Those come courtesy of its deal with Harmonix to supply the official controllers for Rock Band 4 on consoles, which nevertheless sold short of expectations.

It's hard to know how the layoffs will affect its PC peripherals business long-term, but the restructuring announcement accompanied the release of the bizarre RAT 1 mouse, so there doesn't seem to be any shortage of ideas.

Thanks, Gamasutra.