Namit Malhotra’s (in picture below) Double Negative Visual Effects (DNEG; erstwhile Prime Focus) has retrenched around 700 to 800 of its employees in a major cost-cutting drive. The premier computer graphics and visual effects company of India took this decision mainly because the Hollywood studios it services have cut down on production in a major way. The more-than-four-month strike by Hollywood writers and actors last year had such far-reaching consequences that film production has been low ever since. DNEG has done the visual effects work of a number of Hollywood films, many of them award-winning too.
With post-production work from Hollywood studios having reduced, DNEG decided to downsize its massive workforce of 11,000. It did so by retrenching around 7% of its staff.