More than 20 Activision Blizzard staff have now "exited" company since sexual harassment lawsuit became public

Activision Blizzard has said that "more than 20" employees have "exited" the company due to "various resolved reports" in the wake of its sexual harassment becoming public.

A further 20 employees remain at the company after investigation, but have faced "other types of disciplinary action", the company said. For context, Activision Blizzard had 9500 employees total in 2020.

The details come from Fran Townsend, the company's controversial chief compliance officer, in an interview with Financial Times (paywall) via Kotaku.

"It doesn't matter what your rank is, what your job is," Townsend said. "If you've committed some sort of misconduct or you're a leader who has tolerated a culture that is not consistent with our values, we're going to take action."

In a lengthy letter to all staff, Townsend talked up a restructuring of the company's ethics & compliance and employee relations teams and said it had hired three additional staff to investigate reports, with 19 more roles planned.

Meanwhile, in a separate development, Activision Blizzard has filed an application to stay proceedings following the recent and troublesome upset between two investigating bodies (thanks, GamesIndustry.biz).

An accusation of an ethics violation has left the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in conflict over how their separate investigations into Activision Blizzard should proceed.

Activision Blizzard is keen to settle the EEOC's case for $18m - something the DFEH has objected to. The publisher has now asked for the DFEH's original case against it to be placed on hold while the purported ethics violation is investigated.