LIV Golf informed the majority of its staff Wednesday that their jobs have been terminated. The layoffs come as Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund pulls its financial backing of the league.
A LIV Golf spokesperson said in a statement, “The funding commitment announced by PIF earlier this year will reach its conclusion. As a result, we are scaling back operations as we transition to the next chapter of LIV Golf and work toward making LIV 2.0 a reality. This week, we informed many of our colleagues that their employment under LIV 1.0 will end in the first week of September. We are grateful to our employees for their hard work and dedication in building LIV Golf, and we remain committed to supporting those affected through this transition.”
The move was not a surprise. In July, LIV leaders informed employees there would be layoffs in the coming months, and the league filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act notice, which signaled a workforce reduction was possible. The law generally requires businesses with more than 100 employees to provide 60 days of advance notice of potential mass layoffs. The United Kingdom has similar layoff notification requirements.
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Most LIV staffers received official word Wednesday of their termination. The company deactivated staff corporate credit cards the same day, and employees were told their final day is Tuesday, September 1. They will receive lump-sum payments through October 6 to satisfy WARN regulations, plus 15 days of severance.
The layoffs came just days after LIV ended its 2026 season in Indianapolis, its tournament lineup coming to a close a week earlier than planned after the league canceled its previously scheduled finale in Michigan. It is unclear how many employees were impacted or which areas of the operation they worked in, but LIV has more than 300 employees on staff.
The financial strain has extended to LIV’s vendors. Fantasy Interactive, the company that built and maintains LIV’s mobile app and website, filed suit against the league Wednesday in New York State Supreme Court, alleging $992,870.75 in unpaid invoices plus more than $88,000 in interest. It is the fourth vendor to take legal action against LIV over unpaid services in recent months, following similar suits from Deltatre, Fresh Tape Media, and Mobii Systems.
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Earlier this month, LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neil announced the league had secured a lead investor to keep it going after the PIF said it would no longer bankroll the league following at least $6 billion in funding. That investor is believed to be BC Partners, a private equity firm based in London with ties to GSE Worldwide, the agency that represents a sizable portion of LIV’s roster. LIV has established a signed term sheet with BC Partners and the firm’s head of credit, Ted Goldthorpe, who presented to LIV players in Indianapolis last week. Questions remain over whether the backing is structured as a loan, whether it depends on other investors joining, and whether it’s contingent on a certain number of players staying with the league.
Asked last week whether bankruptcy was a possibility, O’Neil did not rule it out. “I don’t think we would rule out any option,” he said. “The whole focus is on transaction, transaction, transaction. We’re spending all our time thinking about how we best land this plane and have it landed so we can take off again.”
LIV doubled its revenue from 2024 to 2025 and says it is on pace to add another $100 million to that mark this year. In April, the league retained investment bank Ducera Partners to run the process of securing new funding. LIV is targeting 10 events for the 2027 season under the proposed LIV 2.0 model, five in the United States and five internationally, with a definitive agreement on new investment expected by September.
