Sony has officially confirmed rumors which have been circulating on Kotaku and other sites since last week, concerning the possibility of shutting down Zipper Interactive, a branch responsible for titles including SOCOM and MAG.

In an official statement, Sony said, “The closure is a result of a normal cycle of resource re-alignment within Sony Computer Entertainment World Wide Studios. Zipper has completed all work associated with its most recent project, Unit 13 for PlayStation Vita. Zipper titles MAG, SOCOM 4 and Unit 13 will continue to be supported, including the new Daily Challenges in Unit 13.”

This unfortunate event occurs as Sony closes a fiscal year in which the company lost 2.9 Billion dollars. Looking at that number in zeros (2,900,000,000.00) might help give a little perspective; although Zipper has brought some good titles to the market, Sony obviously has to make cuts somewhere. At the time of this writing, Sony has not commented on whether or not Zippers 80 employees will be retained in other Sony-owned studios.