Meta confirms another 10,000 layoffs, 13% of its remaining staff, as Zuckerberg says the bursting of the tech bubble was a “sobering wake-up call” and warns that “the new economic reality will continue for many years to come.”
- Mark Zuckerberg announced the layoff today on his Facebook page
- Since December, Meta has cut 24 percent of its original workforce of 86,000.
- Tech stocks have plummeted in the past six months after years of growth
Facebook’s parent company Meta has confirmed it will cut 10,000 jobs in the coming months, on top of the 11,000 it cut in December, cutting its staff by another 13 percent.
Combined, the cuts represent just under a quarter of the company’s 86,000-person workforce.
Zuckerberg announced the cuts on his Facebook page, sharing the internal memo he sent to employees.
It reads: ‘Here’s the timeline to look forward to: Over the next several months, organizational leaders will announce turnaround plans focused on flattening our organizations, canceling lower-priority projects, and lowering our hire rates.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg confirmed the layoffs in an announcement Tuesday morning.
Zuckerberg, writing on his Facebook page, said the layoffs were part of the company’s “year of efficiency.”
“Overall, we expect to reduce our team size by about 10,000 people and close about 5,000 additional open positions that we haven’t hired yet.
‘This will be difficult and there is no way around it. It will mean saying goodbye to talented and passionate colleagues who have been a part of our success.”
They are part of a larger strategy to make the company more “lean and agile.”
Now, Meta will have around 60,000 employees. Meta did not clarify where the cuts would apply.
In his announcement, Zuckerberg pointed to the disastrous decline in technology stocks as one of the reasons for the cuts.
‘Last year was a sobering wake-up call. The global economy changed, competitive pressures increased, and our growth slowed considerably.
‘We slashed budgets, we reduced our real estate footprint, and we made the difficult decision to lay off 13% of our workforce.
‘At this point, I think we need to prepare for the possibility that this new economic reality will continue for many years.
‘Higher interest rates lead to the economy running more efficiently, greater geopolitical instability leads to greater volatility, and greater regulation leads to slower growth and higher innovation costs.
‘Given this outlook, we will need to operate more efficiently than our previous downsizing to ensure success.
“Faced with this new reality, most companies will reduce their long-term vision and investments,” he said.
Meta’s woes are in line with a broader round of layoffs in the tech industry, where growth once seemed invincible.
Microsoft has also launched a third round of layoffs that are part of its previously announced 10,000 job cuts.
Twitter staff have been rocked by brutal layoffs and chaos unleashed by Elon Musk’s hostile takeover of the company.
