A supermajority of quality assurance (QA) workers at ZeniMax just voted to approve the creation of the ZeniMax Workers United/Communications Workers of America. This makes it the first video game studio union under Microsoft. It also makes it the current largest union of video game workers in the United States.
The official voting period ran from December 2 through December 31, 2022. Organization to create the union were underway at ZeniMax for months leading up to this vote. So confident were the employees that the vote would pass that several of them even signed union authorization cards back in November ahead of the vote.
ZeniMax parent company, Microsoft, was very quick to recognize the union and make it official. During voting, Microsoft also remained neutral. A statement was issued by a Microsoft representative earlier today.
"In light of the results of the recent unionization vote, we recognize the Communications Workers of America (CWA) as the bargaining representative for the Quality Assurance employees at ZeniMax. We look forward to engaging in good faith negotiations as we work towards a collective bargaining agreement."
With today's swift approval from Microsoft and the massive support from employees, I would not be surprised to see other gaming divisions under Microsoft and ZeniMax to go the same route of unionizing.