Disney agrees to hire the majority of Character.AI’s workforce
TechCrunch Anthony Ha
Disney plans to hire at least 60 Character.AI workers after the startup’s bankruptcy. It’s a rescue for most of the team, but the deal can still be outbid.
Based on reporting by TechCrunch, Anthony Ha — read the original for the full story.
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Disney is moving to hire the bulk of Character.AI’s workforce after the chatbot startup filed for bankruptcy earlier this week. A legal filing uncovered by Bloomberg says Disney has agreed to make job offers to at least 60 employees, which amounts to the majority of the company’s staff.
The filing puts the annual compensation tied to those offers at about $60 million. It also says the “vast majority” of the employees offered roles accepted them, which makes this look less like a raiding party and more like a controlled evacuation.
The staffing deal sits inside a stalking horse bid, so it is not the final word. Another company can still show up with a better offer and change the outcome.
Character.AI had already said Disney would acquire some of its assets for $20 million, and the company’s former CEO, Karandeep Anand, has since become Disney’s first CTO. The filing says the startup, despite its “large and engaged user base,” was weighed down by high costs and by potential litigation and regulatory scrutiny.
That last part is doing a lot of work. Character.AI has faced a lawsuit from the mother of a 14-year-old boy who said he became obsessed with one of its chatbots before taking his own life, and it is also facing government investigations over child safety concerns.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is what happens when a product gets big and messy at the same time: the people are useful, the brand is radioactive, and somebody with cash starts shopping the wreckage. Disney is clearly buying talent and optionality, not just code. That is a very corporate way to say the AI boom has moved from hype to cleanup.
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