SFX President Responds To Beatport Job Cuts

Yesterday we reported that a merry Christmas was unlikely if you were one of the many employees recently laid off by the online electronic  music specialist Beatport in the run up to festive season.

The SFX owned retailer then confirmed that it would be shutting its San Francisco office and had fired a large section of its employee base including several long term figures at the business.  This new streamlining process closely followed both the $50 million acquisition of the company by SFX Entertainment and SFX’s subsequent listing on the Nasdaq Exchanged as SFXE.

Many sources from within the company naturally suggested that many employees have been surprised by just how swiftly and brutally the axe has been wielded with many observers feeling the pre-Christmas sackings to have been poorly timed.

Now SFX president Tim Crowhurst has responded to the criticisms made by former members of staff and explained why cuts to jobs at Beatport had to be made. Talking to Billboard he said: “The hard conclusion we had to make on Beatport is that we were spread a bit too thin. We had to make some hard choices, frankly, to restructure the team and get everyone focused on one vision.”

Elaborating on what that vision entailed, Crowhurst added: “We’re making it more of a product-focused company as opposed to an engineering company. We’re very focused on creating end-products that the community and all of our constituencies are going to love.”