DC Entertainment Plans to Fire or Move 80 Employees Amid Units' Relocation

DC Entertainment, the New York- based comic-book division of Time Warner Inc., plans to fire or relocate 80 employees amid an announced move of its multimedia and digital-production businesses to California.

About a third of the unit’s estimated 250 employees will be affected. The job changes, to take place between December 2010 and August 2011, were disclosed in a filing dated Sept. 22 with the New York State Department of Labor.

“The reorganization of DC Entertainment includes promotions, relocations and layoffs, and beyond that we are not commenting on any specifics,” Paul McGuire, a spokesman for Warner Bros., a unit of Time Warner, said today in an e-mail.

DC Entertainment announced this week that it will transfer its operations tied to film, TV, digital media, video games, consumer products and administrative work to Burbank, California, to work more closely with the Warner Bros. film studio. The move is to be completed by the end of next year, the company said.

The comic-book and graphic-novel publishing operations are remaining in New York, DC Entertainment said.

The notice filed with New York state says that the affected employees aren’t represented by a union.

Time Warner fell 49 cents, or 1.6 percent, to $30.76 at 4:15 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares have gained 5.6 percent this year.

To contact the reporter on this story: Sarah Rabil in New York at srabil@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Peter Elstrom at pelstrom@bloomberg.net