Sony merges distribution, marketing divisions and cuts 35 staff

Oct. 27, 2020 5:49 PM PT

Culver City-based Sony Pictures Entertainment merged its theatrical, home entertainment and television distribution marketing teams in the U.S., resulting in about 35 layoffs.

The U.S. will be run from a central marketing group overseen by Paul Noble and Danielle Misher, co-heads of theatrical marketing, along with Lexine Wong, head of global multichannel distribution marketing.

Film marketing and distribution teams internationally will be combined into regional groups. Around 35 people will be laid off as part of the process, according to a person with knowledge of the plans who was not authorized to comment. Variety first reported on the cuts.

“The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts on our industry — particularly in how it has upended distribution and the ways in which audiences are consuming content — accelerated the efforts in implementing this restructure,” Josh Greenstein and Keith Le Goy, presidents of the motion picture and television groups, told employees in a memo Tuesday.

Noble, Misher and Wong will report to Greenstein and Le Goy, who oversee distribution and marketing. Andre Caraco, co-president of global marketing, is leaving after more than 30 years at the studio.

The company had been considering this streamlining for some time to create efficiencies and better collaboration, the executives said in a memo.

Sony is the latest Hollywood studio to pursue restructuring in the face of a rapidly changing outlook for media companies. Burbank-based Walt Disney and Warner Bros. have already announced substantial layoffs.

“Ultimately, these changes will better position us as a studio for when we come out of this pandemic,” said Greenstein and Le Goy.