In context: Valve is as a privately owned company and as such it’s never had to divulge information on matters such as payroll or staffing despite its position as one of the most powerful and influential companies in the gaming market. However, an ongoing court case has provided a glimpse into the scale of manpower and money Valve has managed over most of its history.
Information that has leaked from the ongoing antitrust case against Steam operator Valve has hinted at the number of people who have worked at the company and how much Valve paid them over the lifespan of the dominant gaming storefront. Comparing this data with past product releases provides at least a partial picture of the company’s ebb and flow over 18 years.
SteamDB operator Pavel Djundik uncovered the document, and The Verge republished the data before it was redacted. It shows the estimated total amount Valve paid all its employees in four divisions between 2003 and 2021: administration, game development, Steam, and hardware. The Hardware division emerged in 2011.
the wolfire v. valve case had a document published with request for redaction so it has a bunch of black boxes, but some data still remained under it like valves gross margins and commission for 2009-2021, and their employee counts and how much they pay them
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– Pavel Djundik (@thexpaw) July 12, 2024
Prior reports have indicated that Valve’s total headcount never reached 400 people, and the leaked document suggests this is still true. The company’s staff steadily increased to 336 employees in 2021 and has likely grown in the three years since. This number makes the company that oversees the majority of PC game sales seem minuscule compared to publishers like Microsoft, EA, or Ubisoft, which employ thousands.
Steam, a store with tens of millions of daily users that hosts thousands of games, never had more than 142 Valve employees working on it during this period, and that number declined after its peak in 2015. However, gross pay continued rising, reaching $157 million in 2021. The extent of the company’s reliance on outsourcing remains unclear.
Meanwhile, the gaming-related headcount and payroll grew considerably between 2008 and 2014, during which Valve released Left 4 Dead 2, Portal 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, and Dota 2.
The staff has remained stable at around 200 since 2010, but payroll continued increasing, peaking at $236 million in 2019. This indicates a healthy revenue stream from Counter-Strike and Dota. The 2020 launch of Half-Life: Alyx may have also contributed to a modest bump.
Predictably, the hardware division expanded in the mid-2010s, aligning with the introduction of products like the Steam Controller, Steam Link, Steam Machines, and ultimately the Valve Index. The elephant in the room that the document doesn’t cover is the Steam Deck, which launched in 2022. Manufacturing, shipping, and software development related to the handheld gaming PC likely required significant outsourcing.