We within the PC gaming-o-sphere are likely to view Valve as a behemoth. Its iron-fisted dominance of the house is unquestioned and unchallenged, and even the mightiest of videogame publishers ultimately come to kiss the ring. However when it comes to precise dimension, it is probably not so: One of many very fascinating issues we discovered in 2024 is that Valve is, comparatively talking, really fairly small.
Not like most main gamers in gaming, Valve is privately owned, so info on the corporate—headcount, revenues, that form of factor—is mostly not for public consumption. However courtroom paperwork associated to the continuing antitrust lawsuit filed in opposition to Valve by Wolfire Video games in 2021 confirmed that Valve had simply 336 staff that 12 months.
That is larger than a typical tiny startup, sure, but in addition a really small fraction of firms like Ubisoft, which reported 18,666 staff on the finish of September 2024, Digital Arts, which had roughly 13,700 individuals as of March 31, 2024, or Activision Blizzard, which counted roughly 13,000 staff on the finish of 2022, in its ultimate year-end report previous to its acquisition by Microsoft. By way of headcount, Valve is considerably smaller than even Baldur’s Gate 3 developer Larian Studios, which had 470 staff as of March 2024. (It’ll at all times be the quirky little outfit from Ghent to me, although.)
What’s additionally a bit odd is that of these 336 staff, solely 79 had been straight engaged on Steam, although Steam is, by a rustic mile, Valve’s massive cash maker. 181 individuals had been working in Valve’s “Video games” division, doing no matter, whereas 41 had been in {hardware} improvement and 35 dealt with administration duties.
Wolfire criticized this breakdown in its lawsuit, saying Valve “devotes a miniscule share of its income to sustaining and bettering the Steam Retailer.” That criticism presumably is not nearly Steam retailer performance, but in addition its moderation insurance policies, which have been underneath hearth for years for permitting hate teams and extremist content material to flourish.
By one other measure, although, Valve is totally monstrous. Paperwork from that very same lawsuit additionally revealed that when it comes to how a lot cash it makes per worker, Valve towers over the giants of the tech trade. A Valve worker with a keenness for numbers and time on their arms broke down the corporate’s inside figures after which in contrast it with firms together with Apple, Fb, and Netflix. The e-mail chain is redacted so Valve’s per-employee income technology is not identified, however the second-place finisher, Fb, pulled in roughly $780,400 in annual internet earnings per worker, so we not less than know it is greater than that.
These calculations are based mostly on 2018 numbers and so could also be old-fashioned, though Valve hasn’t grown considerably since then and it isn’t as if Steam has all of the sudden stopped raking in cash. Valve clearly is not incomes the revenues of the opposite firms on the record, however when it comes to uncooked effectivity, that is enormous. And, slightly like how the low Steam headcount casts an unflattering gentle on its moderation issues, that form of cash-crankin’ would possibly lead one to wonder if Valve’s 30% minimize on Steam gross sales (with reductions based mostly on gross sales quantity) is actually behind the occasions, as Wolfire, Epic Video games, and others insist. Alternatively, nothing succeeds like success, and Valve doing a lot with so little suggests it must be doing one thing proper.
2025 might be an fascinating 12 months for Valve: After years of slowly grinding by means of the method, Wolfire’s antitrust lawsuit in opposition to Valve was licensed as a category motion in November, which means it now encompasses “all individuals or entities” who’ve bought video games on Steam since 2017. That very same month, US Senator Mark Warner despatched a letter to Valve boss Gabe Newell warning of “extra intense scrutiny from the federal authorities” if it does not crack down on extremist content material on the platform.
