Layoffs around the world have set a grim new year for thousands of tech workers. In less than a week in 2023, more than 30,000 workers globally have lost their jobs. Incidentally, this is almost double the number of people fully laid off in December 2022.
A significant portion of this figure comes from Amazon.com Inc’s decision to lay off more than 18,000 roles as part of workforce reductions. The Jeff Bezos-owned company has now surpassed the 11,000 cuts announced last year by Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc.
Companies including Meta Platforms Inc, Amazon.com, Twitter Inc and Snap Inc have combined to cut more than 97,000 jobs in 2022 as the organizations grapple with a slowing economy and shareholder pressures. This number is 649% more than 2021. And if this week is any indication, the situation is only going to get worse.
Data from the layoff tracker shows that a total of 30,611 people from 30 companies were laid off in the first six days of January. Apart from Amazon, the list includes video hosting platform Vimeo, tech giant Salesforce, crypto exchange Huobi and many more.
Vimeo CEO Anjali Sood announced via LinkedIn two days back that the company would be laying off 11% of its workforce amid ‘difficult times’. Major crypto exchange Huobi is looking to lay off around 20% of its staff. Meanwhile, real estate brokerage Compass Inc has also announced more layoffs – its third such round in recent days.
After a decade and a half of rapid hiring and big acquisitions, another tech giant also announced plans to lay off thousands of employees this week. Salesforce said in a regulatory filing that about 10% of its 80,000-strong workforce would be laid off. The pandemic has reduced the number of employees hired to less than half and follows the announced exit of co-CEO Brett Taylor in December and the elimination of hundreds of sales positions in November.
Tech giants Microsoft and Google-parent Alphabet have also indicated cost-cutting measures, including layoffs.
(with inputs from agencies)
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