Zynga revisits management structure, three top executives depart

Three top executives of struggling Zynga will move out of the company, as the games developer aims to flatten its management structure.

As part of the organizational changes announced by new CEO Don Mattrick, Zynga’s CTO Cadir Lee, Chief People Officer Colleen McCreary and Chief Operations Officer David Ko will be leaving the company to pursue other interests.

Mattrick, formerly president of Microsoft’s Interactive Entertainment Business, was appointed as CEO and board member in July replacing Mark Pincus, Zynga’s founding CEO, who continued as chairman of the board and chief product officer.

“We are taking layers out of the executive rank to get senior leaders closer to important product initiatives,” Mattrick said in an email to employees, that was also published on the company’s blog on Tuesday.

Mattrick announced other leadership changes. The company has, for example, appointed Steve Chiang as executive vice president of games for the Villes titles other than FarmVille. He was president of games since November, charged with overseeing all games and new development across web and mobile. Barry Cottle, appointed chief revenue officer in November, is now executive vice president of games for Social Casino.

Zynga reported in July a net loss of US$16 million in the second quarter. Revenue in the quarter declined 31 percent year-over-year to $231 million, while bookings were down 38 percent to $188 million. The company said it expected to see more volatility in its business than it would like over the next two to four quarters, as it resets its business.

Mattrick wrote Tuesday he had been working with the company’s leaders to review different parts of the business “in order to develop a set of operating principles to help reset the company.” “We are now calibrating against the market opportunity and developing detailed plans to achieve topline growth and improve profitability in the future,” he added.