Ben Huh's LOLCat Empire Axes a Third of Its Staff
Cheezburger Network, which has amassed a heap of attention (and millions in VC money) just announced it's canning 24 employees. Why? Well, they're just not making enough money. Full statement below:
Cheezburger, one of the largest social humor sites, today announced its plans to prioritize its mobile initiatives and reorganize its operations into one centralized team based in Seattle. As a part of this effort, Cheezburger is eliminating 24 positions across the organization.
“Eliminating these positions was a difficult decision,” said CEO Ben Huh. “For Cheezburger to fulfill its promise, we need to be nimble and innovate on one platform optimized for any device, everywhere. Bringing our team in-house and streamlining operations will help us realize that vision.”
Cheezburger’s mobile usage has doubled from last year, achieving the top spot in comScore’s mobile humor category. The company is focusing its revenue model on high-value, marquee partnerships with advertisers seeking to drive deeper engagement with users.
Cheezburger has appointed two new executives to help drive this next phase of operations and strategy for the company. Cliff Sharples, who previously served as Vice President of Product has been promoted to Chief Operating Officer in addition to seasoned technology veteran Jeff Brown, who has been named Chief Technology Officer.
“Cheezburger serves millions of people every day with the best collection of humor sites on the Web,” said board member Greg Gottesman, Managing Director of Madrona Venture Group. “We are confident that Cheezburger is focused in the right direction and fully support the team.”
Declining ad revenues are a problem, but so is the basic business: it's just very, very easy to find an animal meme picture online. [Geekwire]
Image via Cheezburger
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