Former Ubisoft Halifax workers holding rally after studio shut down

More than three weeks after Ubisoft shut down its Halifax studio, some of its former workers are holding a rally at Grand Parade on Thursday as they call for their jobs to be reinstated.

On Jan. 7, Ubisoft – a Paris-based video game company best known for the Assassin’s Creed and Fary Cry series – shut down its Halifax studio as part of what it called a two-year process to streamline its operations.

The move put 71 people out of a job, including lead programmer Jon Huffman, who noted the timing of the closure didn’t seem to line up with Ubisoft’s broader restructuring.

“Ubisoft seems to have retroactively included the Halifax studio into this restructuring,” he said. “If it was always planned as a global restructuring, why was it rushed?”

Since the closure of the Halifax studio, Ubisoft has also closed studios in Stockholm and Sweden, and cancelled multiple games.

A few weeks prior to the closure, the Halifax studio, which was founded in 2010, became the first Ubisoft union in North America when 61 of its 71 employees joined CWA Canada Local 30111.

Ubisoft, which still has seven studios in Canada, previously said the decision to close the Halifax location was not related to the unionization efforts. It also noted none of the Halifax studio employees will be moved to other teams.

“Ubisoft fully respects employees’ right to unionize and has unionized teams globally,” the company said.

Two weeks ago, CWA Canada filed a complaint with the Nova Scotia Labour Board, calling for better compensation and new jobs for the laid-off workers.

“Ubisoft took $12 million in taxpayer money from the government of Nova Scotia to nurture a generation of talent, and to build a tech industry,” CWA said. “Now it’s walking away without so much as an apology.”

Huffman said they have launched a letter-writing campaign to demand Ubisoft reopen the studio and reinstate the employees. So far it has seen 600 letters.

“We want to get people back to work,” he said. “We’re hoping by drawing attention to it and bringing it up, it will cause some revaluation, whether it results in a full studio reopening or some of our team going remote.

“To have such a great response and to be working to that milestone of 800 letters is fantastic. Hoping it can pick up steam.”

Huffman said the rally will be held at 10 a.m. at Grand Parade on Thursday.

“We’re trying to be humble on this and if we get 40 or 50 people, we’d be thrilled,” he said.

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