It is understood that despite Valve’s strong position in the PC gaming sector, its actual scale is relatively small. According to court documents, Valve had only 336 employees in 2021, significantly lower than companies like Ubisoft and EA. Ubisoft had 18,666 employees in September 2024, EA had approximately 13,700 employees in March 2024, and Blizzard had nearly 13,000 employees by the end of 2022.
Notably, although Steam is Valve’s primary source of revenue, the majority of Valve’s employees are not directly involved in the operation of Steam. Among the 336 employees, only 79 are specifically responsible for Steam, with the rest working in areas such as game development, hardware research and development, and administrative management. This employee allocation by Valve has also been criticized by Wolfire Games in antitrust litigation, arguing that Valve’s investment in maintaining and improving the Steam store is minimal, especially with regard to platform content regulation. However, despite the small number of employees, Valve’s profit efficiency is exceptionally high. Financial data disclosed in the lawsuit shows that Valve’s annual revenue per employee far exceeds other tech giants such as Facebook and Netflix. Although Valve’s total revenue is not on par with these companies, its efficient profit model and low-cost operations set it apart in the industry. Currently, Valve is facing an antitrust lawsuit from Wolfire Games, which was certified as a class action in November 2024, involving all individuals and entities that have sold games on the Steam platform since 2017. In addition, US Senator Mark Warner has also sent a letter to Valve CEO Gabe Newell (G胖), warning that if Valve does not increase its regulation of extreme content on the platform, it may face stricter federal government scrutiny. This article was produced and published by gamehiving and is prohibited from being reprinted without permission.
