Recently, an Indonesian video game and animation studio Brandoville Studios has been the subject of controversy. Former workers reported that they have been going through various abuse, injustice, and unfair treatment while working in the studio. The reports vary, ranging from constant overwork and underpay to physical abuse and micromanaging the worker’s personal life. Those reports have been shared unanimously on social media and become viral in Indonesian media.
Various Indonesian media and creative workers already speak their support for the workers and hope that this situation can be resolved. Both the Indonesian Game Association (AGI) and the Indonesian Animation Industry Association (AINAKI) condemned the action of Brandoville Studio and stated they are committed to creating a safe working environment for Indonesian creative workers. Other organizations like Indonesian Woman in Game (IWIG) have also pledged their support for the victims. IWIG specifically urges the victims to speak up and report this case to the Indonesian National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), Ministry of Women Empowerment and Child Protection (KemenPPPA), or Indonesian National Commission on Woman Rights (Komnas Perempuan).
In this article, KAORI Nusantara teams will explain what we currently know about the controversy and why this controversy could become so big. Hopefully, the overseas reader can understand who Brandoville Studios is, who is operating the studio, and why this controversy become so big in Indonesia.
Who is Brandoville Studio?
On its Indonesian site, Brandoville Studios describes itself as an Indonesian AAA game art and animation studio. Located in Sumenep Street No. 23, Menteng, Central Jakarta, the studio is owned by a Canadian-Hong Kong couple Ken Lai and Cherry Lai. Previously, the studio was a subsidiary of a Malaysian Studio Lemon Sky, before it became its own entity in 2020.
The studio is well-known as the studio where major Western game studios outsourced their work. It’s hard to list the exact title of the games as it was never listed due to NDA. However, our report suggested that Brandoville Studios’ clients include major game studios like Ubisoft (Assassins Creed: Shadows), Naughty Dog (Last of Us), and Relic Entertainment (Company of Heroes 3). The studio was also involved in the creation of animated films and series like Ice Age: The Adventures of Buck Wild (available on Disney+), The Dragon Prince series and Mermaid Magic (both are available on Netflix).
This is not the first time Brandoville Studio become a subject of controversy. In 2021, both Brandoville Studio and Lemon Sky were featured in a video How Game Publishers Buy Crunch Overseas created by People Make Games. In the video, some of Brandoville Studios’ employees complained about how the studio made them work overtime without payment. When People Make Games asked Brandoville Studios for clarification, the studio representative stated that overtime is not paid because they also spend money to train those employees and the overtime is voluntary.
Because the studio is operated in Indonesia, then the studio must be operated under a certain legal entity. When we searched the available company name on the AHU’s website (AHU: Administrasi Hukum Umum, the Indonesian government entity that supervises the legal administration), we found that two companies use “Brandoville” as the name: PT Brandoville Studios Makmur and PT Brandoville Edukasi Kreatif.
Considering the address, we can conclude that PT Brandoville Studios Makmur is the legal entity of Brandoville Studios. The other entity, PT Brandoville Edukasi Kreatif, could be the legal entity of Brandoville Academy, an animation school that was also created by Ken Lai.
It’s hard to find more information about the studio’s organizational structure studio. The studio’s website only shows Ken Lai as the CEO. However after searching further, we found the company structure of the studio in an internship thesis (Indonesian: laporan magang) written by Alan Santoso from Multimedia Nusantara University in 2021. The company’s organisational structure at that time looks like this:
Upon researching further via LinkedIn, we found that from that at least Jeremy Anandajoo, Muhammad Iqbal, Agus Wibowo, and Jack Cheng were still working in the studio until the studio closed its operation on 17 August 2024. Out of those names, Jeremy’s name is often mentioned during the current controversy. Also note that while Ken Lai is listed as the CEO of the studio, Cherry Lai’s name is not mentioned in the organizational structure even though many sources claim that she is supposed to be one of the studio’s leaders.
How did the Controversy Blow Up?
The controversy first blew up after a Canva document created by Christa, a former employee of the Brandoville Studio, was leaked through social media via @Bisher_d890 X account. Written mostly in English, the document contains all the abuse that Christa has received during her time in the studio, along with the screenshots that prove Christa’s point.
This is abhorrent and should be dealt with in a court, Cherry Lai of Brandoville Studios abuse of her employees:https://t.co/7qudhxMY1E
Brandoville, formerly part of Lemon Sky, had a big scandal back in 2021 about the horrible working conditions
(Abuse & self harm)
— Bisher Dokkmak (@Bisher_d790) September 9, 2024
Here’s the link for the Canva document: link*.
*WARNING: THE CONTENTS INSIDE THE CANVA DOCUMENT CONTAIN VERY SENSITIVE SUBJECT MATTER THAT INCLUDE, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, ABUSE, BULLYING, MANIPULATION, AND SELF-HARM. PLEASE READ IT CAREFULLY AT YOUR DISCRETION
According to the document, Christa first applied in 2019 at Brandoville as a concept artist. She didn’t get the job. However, Cherry Lai offered her a job as a Marketing Officer with a monthly salary of IDR 4,000,000, which was barely above the minimum wage in the Jakarta area at that time (IDR 3,940,973 in 2019). Christa accepted the job because she didn’t have a good relationship with his family during that time. She also hopes that she can land the concept artist job later after a few years working for the studio, as that’s the job that interests her in the first place.
Unfortunately after accepting the offer, Christa received many horrifying treatments from Cherry Lai. The most notable ones include (but are not limited to):
- Christa had to slap herself 100 times and recorded it as punishment.
- Working sleep-deprived as she had to work 4 days straight without any sleep.
- Working during sickness several times, one of them was when she had to work while infected by COVID-19. Cherry Lai herself prohibited her from taking the COVID test.
- Forced resignation at least twice. First in April 2023, and second around October 2023. In December 2023, she was rehired but as an intern with only a salary of IDR 1,500,000. Because of this intern status, she also lost her health insurance.
- Money extortion. Cherry repeatedly told Christa to pay for various things which included Cherry’s personal expenses and Christa’s Unreal Engine course (According to Christa, she learned nothing from this because Jeremy, who was the course instructor, never taught the students anything).
- Personal life micromanaging. Christa was being told to rent a room near the office and cut off her contact with her family.
- Various physical abuses, including being slapped publicly in the St. Regis Hotel. According to Christa, she also developed Sinusitis because of this.
Christa received those abuses from she first worked with the company until her resignation in July 2024. After the resignation, Christa’s mom and her lawyer try to meet Cherry, asking her for compensation. However, Cherry refused to meet them. At this point, Christa and her family haven’t felt safe as she had received death threats from Cherry for years. Cherry also tried to send Christa some items repeatedly through one of Brandoville’s employees, Jeremy, but Christa refused as she didn’t want to deal with Cherry anymore.
After the document became viral, more and more victims opened up on social media, albeit anonymously. They also experience similar problems during their time working for the studio. Some of the notable ones include overworking during pregnancy, purposefully creating drama to hide office problems from clients, cutting the payment for employees, and many more. Many more details are compiled in this document, which is written in Bahasa Indonesia.
Because of this, many Indonesians reacted on social media. They expressed their sympathy to the victims and demanded the owners of Brandoville Studios, Cherry Lai and Ken Lai, to be investigated by police for their actions. However, both owners already left Indonesia.
Updates: On 19 September 2024, Christa finally appeared in the public on Ecummurz YouTube channel and shared her story. Her story, which is told in Bahasa Indonesia, is available here:
The Source of the Problems
Many of the victims’ claim seems outrageous. Because of this, we contacted a former employee who worked at the studio in 2023. When we asked, they confidently said that most of the rumours were true. “What is written in the Canva, it’s true”, they said. “Abuse did happen, especially in the art and marketing department”.
According to our contact, the source of the problem was Cherry Lai herself. “She’s truly the devil. Constantly creating problems in the studio, suddenly getting angry for no reason. Even worse, her husband does nothing about it.”
Our contact is also disappointed that Cherry’s husband Ken Lai. he’s the actual CEO of the studio, yet he did nothing to stop his wife. Our contact also mentioned Jeremy repeatedly, calling him for helping Cherry and let the abuse happen in the studio.
“Jeremy is like Cherry’s personal satpam (Indonesian word for security guard). He makes sure the employee works as Cherry intended. Sometimes he came to our room just to check on us.”
In the organizational structure above, it’s also clear that Ken Lai is the head of the studio and Cherry Lai has no organizational role. Of course, the structure itself was created in 2021. There is a chance that Cherry Lai came into management later. However according to the Canva document and the video from People Make Games above, the unfair treatment already happened before 2021.
One of the unfair treatment our contact has received is when he was taking a leave. According to our contact, there are times when our contact has to work during the holiday and the lead promised that he can take a paid leave according to the number of days he spent in the office. When they finally took the leave, he also asked for more days as they contractually still had paid leave quota. However, Cherry got angry and counted the leave as unpaid leave.
When we asked why they didn’t report this contract violation, our contact gave us an interesting answer. According to our contact, they never actually get a copy of their contract after the contract signing. Because of this, they can’t check the terms and agreement later when trouble arises. “One of us asked for a copy of the contract before. However, they was forced to resign after that.”
Interestingly when we asked for his opinion of the studio itself, our contact still said something positive about the studio in general. It’s just Cherry screwed up a lot of things in the studio.
“When I see beyond the controversy, I do believe Brandoville studio is actually a decent studio. Their employees are good, the experts in their field. Their clients are big AAA studios. The pay is also good. Really a good place to learn. I personally stayed there because I wanted to get more experience, though I also plan to leave. Maybe after a few years.”
Considering Christa’s story in the Canva document, we were surprised when our contact said that the pay was good. But when we searched further, we found a spreadsheet document that contained various problematic animation studio wages. In the document, the monthly salary of Brandoville Studios is listed as USD 660 or around IDR 10,171,722. “Yeah. It’s around that number”, said our contact when we clarified. It means that our contact and probably many other employees are paid far higher than Christa’s.
In the end, he pointed out again that Cherry is the source of all problems. Other employees, except Ken Lai and Jeremy, are great people who are trapped in unfortunate circumstances. “My lead is the one who protected me from Cherry. Really, the source of the studio problem, from abuse, underpay, crunch, and other things, can be traced to back Cherry again. Without her, the studio will be okay. If this controversy is brought up sooner, or if the higher-ups realize the problem and get rid of Cherry, maybe the studio will do great and become one of the best studios in Indonesia.”
The Current Situation and Implication
Right now, controversies have blown up in Indonesia. Police have promised to investigate this case. However, the studio already stopped its operation on 17 August 2024. Both Ken Lai and Cherry Lai have also left Indonesia.
Recent developments also showed that Ken Lai and Cherry Lai already planned to open a new studio called Lailai Studios. However due to the controversies, the studio never operates. There are also reports by the X account @vngnc that the studio already changed its base operation to Hong Kong.
barusan dengar berita kalau Lailai Studios lewat website mereka (yang sekarang udah nggak bisa diakses) mengubah lokasi studio mereka dari Jakarta menjadi Hong Kong.
foto Ken Lai juga sudah dihapus dari website.
kalau benar mereka akan tetap buka di Hong Kong, gue rasa kecil…
— izzy (@vngnc) September 14, 2024
On X, Jeremy is also issued a public apology. Jeremy himself is often mentioned in the Canva document above and pointed out by our contact as Cherry’s right-hand man. Until this article is written, it’s unclear whether the police have questioned Jeremy or not.
I want to openly apologize for both my actions and inaction that contributed to the toxic work environment under Cherry Lai’s control. I deeply regret my role in fostering such a harmful atmosphere, and I take full responsibility for my part in it.
— 🥟 (@ieremaias) September 12, 2024
But this controversy should also be a grim reminder for us that even with its recent development, the Indonesian creative industry is still not in a great place. Worker abuse, underpaid workers, crunch, and many other problems are still common. Overseas studios often outsource their project to Indonesian studios or animators. However, those workers are still lacked protection and vulnerable to exploitation. If we want to create a better, safer working environment for our creative workers, then we better act now.
Also read:
The Indonesian Anime Times | The article was updated on 23 September 2024 after Christa appeared in public and shared her story.
Damn, this is bad. Like, this is literally “black company you heard about overseas” level of bad. I know that they exist here too – bad boss and bad management isn’t monopolized by any one culture – but this is a surprising level of outright maliciousness.
Yeah, the situation is scary. The problem is probably more common in Indonesia than we thought.
Maybe not to the physical abuse level like in the BV Studios, but I’ve heard cases like underpaid and overwork before. I hope this could government and association like AGI or INAKI could do something and fix this situation in the future.