Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook, announced on Tuesday plans to eliminate 10,000 jobs, marking a second wave of large-scale layoffs in just four months. This announcement follows the earlier reduction of 11,000 positions, making Meta the first major technology firm to implement consecutive mass layoffs.
In a communication to employees, Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg stated, “We expect to reduce our team size by around 10,000 people and to close around 5,000 additional open roles that we haven’t yet hired.”
This decision is part of a broader restructuring strategy aimed at simplifying Meta’s organizational framework. The company intends to cancel lower-priority projects and slow down hiring rates. Following the news, Meta’s stock experienced a 2 percent increase in premarket trading.
Zuckerberg is emphasizing efficiency in 2023, targeting cost reductions of up to $5 billion and adjusting overall expenses to fall between $89 billion and $95 billion.
A challenging economic landscape has led to widespread job cuts across various sectors in the United States, affecting companies from Wall Street financial institutions like Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to tech giants such as Amazon and Microsoft.
Since the beginning of 2022, the technology sector has seen more than 280,000 job eliminations, with approximately 40 percent occurring this year, according to a tracking site dedicated to layoffs.
Meta has been investing heavily in developing the metaverse, but it has encountered difficulties due to a decline in advertising revenue attributed to inflation and rising interest rates that have affected many companies.
The layoffs announced in November, which represented a 13 percent reduction in its workforce, were a historic first for Meta in its 18-year existence. As of the end of 2022, the company employed approximately 86,482 individuals, which was a 20 percent increase compared to the previous year.
© Thomson Reuters 2023
