Valve’s Employee Compensation Revealed: Remarkably Low Headcount and Paycheck Figures

Valve is a renowned company known for its secrecy and significant impact on the gaming industry, specifically through its operation of the PC gaming platform, Steam. Despite its significant influence, Valve operates with a small workforce compared to giants like EA and Riot Games. Leaked data from Wolfire’s antitrust lawsuit against Valve reveals that as of 2021, Valve employed only 336 staff members. This information gives us insight into the company’s headcount, gross pay, and gross margins over 18 years.

The employee data provided in the leaked document spans from 2003, a few years after Valve’s founding in 1996 and the launch of Steam, until 2021. The data categorizes Valve employees into four groups: “Admin,” “Games,” “Steam,” and “Hardware,” which was introduced in 2011. The leaked document includes a detailed breakdown of Valve’s headcount and payroll expenses for each category over the years.

One intriguing data point is Valve’s spending on game development, which peaked in 2017 at $221 million. Surprisingly, this occurred in a year when the company did not release any new games. It is likely that these expenditures were dedicated to supporting existing games such as Dota 2 and the development of upcoming titles like Artifact. However, by 2021, Valve’s game development spending had decreased to $192 million.

Another notable finding is that as of 2021, Valve employed only 79 individuals for Steam, an incredibly influential gaming storefront. This small workforce is responsible for managing one of the most significant platforms in the gaming industry, showcasing Valve’s ability to achieve great results with limited resources.

One aspect that surprised me was the relatively small size of the “Hardware” category within Valve. In 2021, only 41 employees were assigned to this category, with a total payroll expense exceeding $17 million. However, considering the immense success of Valve’s Steam Deck, I anticipate that the company has expanded its hardware-focused workforce since then. In a statement to The Verge in November 2023, Valve’s Pierre-Loup Griffais suggested that Valve is now firmly established as a hardware company.

These findings shed light on Wolfire’s allegations in their lawsuit against Valve, claiming that the company dedicates a minimal percentage of its revenue to maintaining and improving the Steam Store. Valve’s limited workforce across various departments could explain the company’s relatively limited product list, despite being the de facto PC gaming platform. To compensate for these limitations, Valve has collaborated with other companies to develop Steam boxes and controllers. The company’s flat organizational structure may also contribute to this phenomenon.

The size of Valve’s staff has been a contentious issue raised by Wolfire. In their 2021 lawsuit, Wolfire estimated that Valve had approximately 360 employees based on information likely sourced from Valve itself in 2016. Wolfire further claimed that Valve’s per-employee profit was around $15 million per year. Although the exact accuracy of this estimation is uncertain, Valve, in its publicly available employee handbook, states that its profitability per employee exceeds that of tech giants like Google, Amazon, and Microsoft. While the specific profit numbers for Valve employees remain redacted in the leaked document, they likely support Valve’s claim.

Although the leaked data does not include profit figures, it offers a more comprehensive understanding of Valve’s expenditure on its staff. Considering the immense popularity of Steam, it is safe to assume that Valve’s spending on its workforce is only a fraction of the revenue generated by the company. While Valve has yet to respond to requests for comments on the leaked data, it is evident that their small team has been able to achieve remarkable success in the gaming industry.

In conclusion, Valve’s small staff size, as revealed through leaked data from Wolfire’s antitrust lawsuit, provides insight into the company’s operations and expenditure on human resources. Despite employing a relatively small number of individuals, Valve has had a significant impact on the gaming industry through its PC gaming platform, Steam. The leaked data highlights Valve’s dedication to game development and the overall management of Steam, which has solidified its position as a dominant force in the gaming world.



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