How Unity CEO Matt Bromberg stopped the ‘war’ against its customers

Decoder with Nilay Patel

Vox Media Podcast Network

Technology, Business

4.3 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 31 March 2025

⏱️ 75 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Unity is one of those hidden in plain sight companies we love here on Decoder, and CEO Matt Bromberg is in many ways the perfect Decoder guest. He's been on the job less than a year and took over in a moment of crisis. He describes the company as being "at war with its customers" before he joined, and he's not wrong. The game industry right now is also contracting overall — studios are closing, and some big bets on things like the metaverse and live service games haven’t paid off. So we talked about all that, and where Matt sees growth ahead: Unity isn’t just a game engine provider, but the platform for everything from running those big live services and the monetization on top of them. Links: Unity’s struggles continue with fresh wave of layoffs | The Verge Unity attempts to turn things around with latest game engine release | The Verge Unity has eliminated its controversial runtime fee | The Verge ‘We want to be a fundamentally different and better company’ | IGN John Riccitiello is out at Unity, effective immediately | The Verge Unity is laying off 25% of its staff | The Verge Unity cancels town hall over reported death threats | The Verge Unity has changed its pricing model and developers are pissed off | The Verge Toyota chooses Unity for next-generation interface | Unity Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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1:35.0	Hello and welcome to Decoder. I'm Neil Appetal, editor-in-chief of The Verge, and Decoder is my show about big ideas and other problems.
1:41.4	Today I'm talking with Matt Bromberg, the CEO of Unity, one of the leading
1:45.3	video game development platforms. He's been in that job for less than a year, and in many ways,
1:50.3	Matt is the perfect Decoder guest. See, Unity is one of those companies that we love talking
	...

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