A former Activision executive has sued the publisher in California state court accusing the company of age discrimination and violating the state’s whistleblower protection law, as reported by Law360.
The suit was filed earlier this week by a 57-year-old former tech executive who worked for the company from 2014 until being laid off as part of a restructuring in the Activision Blizzard’s Central Tech department last August.
The lawsuit gives several examples to establish that Activision Blizzard discriminated against him, starting with statements Bobby Kotick allegedly made at a leadership conference that the “problem” with Activision Blizzard is that “there are too many old white guys.” (The suit doesn’t say exactly when the conference was.)
If that’s the case his ex employer will be able to prove he wasn’t competent to do the job anymore but if there’s communications that prove they did it because he’s white or he’s old and that’s the reason he got laid off, then that’s discrimination plain and simple.