Though technology companies announced massive layoffs last year, 2023 is looking much worse, as tech giants including Amazon, Facebook parent company Meta, Microsoft, Google, IBM, SAP, and Salesforce — as well as many smaller tech companies — announce sweeping jobs cuts.
The problem: Big Tech went on a hiring binge during the pandemic when lockdowns sparked a tech buying spree to support remote work and an uptick in e-commerce, and now they face revenue declines.
Although global IT spending is forecast to rise in 2023, with enterprise software and IT services experiencing the greatest growth, the overall increase is expected to be modest, with data center systems and communications services growing by less than 1%, according to market research firm Gartner. Meanwhile hardware sales are forecast to decline.
Continuing supply chain issues, inflation, and the war in Ukraine are also having an impact on both business and consumer spending, leading to fears of recession.
According to data compiled by Layoffs.fyi, the online tracker keeping tabs on job losses in the technology sector, 494 tech companies have laid off 138,820 so far this year.
While high-profile tech companies such as Amazon and Microsoft have already announced significant job cuts this year, the silver lining for technology pros is that many of the layoffs involve non-technical staff. In fact, a lack of experienced tech talent means companies have been raising salaries for IT professionals, with consultancy Janco Associates predicting that raises for IT pros could jump 8% in 2023.
Here is a list — to be updated regularly — of some of the most prominent technology layoffs the industry has experienced recently.
March 2023
Amazon to lay off 9,000 more workers, including some at AWS
Amazon said it plans to lay off about 9,000 more workers from several business units, including AWS, PXT (People Experience and Technology, the company’s HR arm), Advertising, and Twitch. The announcement came two months after Amazon unveiled plans to lay off 18,000 employees. AWS is a big revenue generator for Amazon but has not been immune to current macroeconomic conditions. Revenue growth slowed sharply in the fourth quarter of 2022, to 20% in year-on-year terms. That’s well below the 27.5% and 33% figures seen in the previous two quarters.
Meta cuts an additional 10,000 jobs from global workforce
Four months after social media giant Meta confirmed that it would cut 13% of its global workforce — amounting to 11,000 jobs — the company announced a further 10,000 layoffs. Additionally, Meta said that it would leave 5,000 currently empty roles unfilled. Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg cited difficult macroeconomic conditions and a focus on “flattening” the company’s organizational structure as key factors in the decision to cut more staff.
Atlassian lays off 5% of staff to refocus on cloud, ITSM
Collaboration software company Atlassian said that it plans to fire 500 employees, or around 5% of its overall workforce. The Australia-based company said that the job losses were organizational, and not driven by a need to cut costs — despite posting a net loss in its February financials, Atlassian saw its revenue grow 27%, to $873 million in the last quarter.
February 2023
Feb. 27: Twitter stealthily lays off 10% of remaining workers, including tech staff
This round of Twitter layoffs saw the embattled social media platform lose 10% of its remaining workers, as about 200 were fired. The layoffs included startup founders whose companies had been absorbed by Twitter, including Esther Crawford, most recently the head of Twitter Blue. Twitter has fewer than 2,000 workers left on staff, down from about 7,500 just before Elon Musk bought the company in late October 2022.
Feb. 13: Twilio announces fresh round of layoffs, impacting 17% of its workforce
Twilio announced that it would slash its workforce by roughly 1,400, months after laying off an additional 816 during the fourth quarter of 2022. The cloud communications company said also that it would reorganize internally, creating two new business units, Twilio Communications and Twilio Data & Applications, in an official blog post. Before these two recent rounds of layoffs, the company employed nearly 9,000 workers.
Feb. 10: Microsoft cuts HoloLens, Xbox, Surface jobs as industrial metaverse team said to fold
Microsoft confirmed that it is cutting employees working on its HoloLens, Surface laptop and Xbox products, as reports surfaced that the tech giant will be laying off 100 employees working for its industrial metaverse team and closing that unit. The move to cut staff working on HoloLens and in its industrial metaverse team came as a surprise since the the company had made recent moves to expand efforts to move its augmented reality, virtual reality and metaverse initiatves from the consumer to the enterprise side. In a statement, though, Microsoft said it was committed to the industrial metaverse. The company did not specify how many jobs it would cut in those areas, though a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) from Washington state Friday noted that Microsoft had reported that 617 employees would be laid off in Redmond, Bellevue and Issaquah.
Feb. 10: Yahoo to lay off 20% of its staff as it cuts advertising tech business
Yahoo said it will lay off about 20% of its staff, or apporximately 1,600 workers, by the end of year, according to media reports confirmed by the company. The move is aimed at restructuring the company’s advertising technology business unit and reallocating its finances more efficiently. The layoffs mark the end of Yahoo’s attempts to be a direct competitor to Google and Meta in the digital advertising market.
Feb. 9: GitHub lays off 10% workforce, plans to go fully remote to cut costs
Microsoft-owned software development and version control service provider GitHubowned by Microsoft said it would be cutting 10% of its workforce, or about 300 employees, and moving the remaining staff to remote work in order to safeguard the company’s immediate financial stability.
The layoffs came about a month after the company enacted a hiring freeze.
Feb. 7: Zoom lays off 15% of its workforce after growth spurt during pandemic
Cloud-based videoconferencing service provider Zoom said that it was laying off 15% of its workforce, fearing uncertain macroeconomic conditions. The move came after the company went on a hiring spree during the pandemic.
In addition, Zoom said it is also making changes in team structure and several members of its leadership team will take pay cuts.
Feb. 6: Dell Technologies to lay off 6,650 staffers
Due to declining PC sales and infrastructure requirements, Dell Technologies said it would lay off 6,650 workers, or about 5% of its total workforce. In addition to the downsizing, Co-Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke said the company would introduce changes that include changing the structure of its sales team and integrating the services division of its consumer and infrastructure businesses.
Feb. 2: Splunk to lay off 4% of its workforce to reduce costs
In a company filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Splunk said it would be laying off 4% of its workforce as part of broader measures to optimize costs and processes ahead of uncertain macroeconomic conditions. The decision to downsize will affect 325 employees at the company, mostly in the North America region.
Feb. 1: PayPal to lay off 2,000 employees
In a message shared with PayPal employees and posted on the company’s online newsroom, PayPal President and CEO Dan Schulman said the company was set to cut 2,000 jobs, about 7% of its workforce.
Although the company beat analyst expectations in November when it reported its third quarter financial results, PayPal downgraded its forecast for the fourth quarter, citing a challenging macro environment and slowing e-commerce trends.
January 2023
Jan. 26: SAP announces 2,800 job cuts, says they're unrelated to over-hiring or performance
Despite revenue rising 11% in 2022, during an announcement about its fourth quarter financial results, SAP said that due to net income dropping by 68%, the company would be undertaking some restructuring, resulting in layoffs.
Whereas companies such as Google or Salesforce announced across-the-board layoffs based on performance review criteria to reverse over-hiring during the pandemic period, CEO Christian Klein said that the job cuts are part of “a targeted restructuring” and not performance-based.
“We definitely didn’t over-hire,” Klein said, noting that revenue grew faster than SAP employee growth in 2022.
Jan. 26: IBM cuts 3,900 remaining employees after double asset disposal
After spinning off most of its infrastructure management division as a new business, Kyndryl, in November 2021, and selling some assets of its Watson Health business in January 2022, on the same day as IBM’s Q4 2022 results were announced, the company said it was eliminating 3,900 job roles, or 1.5% of its global workforce.
On a conference call with analysts to discuss the results, CFO Jim Kavanaugh didn't directly mention the job cuts, instead alluding vaguely to the situation by acknowledging the business would have some "stranded costs" to address in early 2023, resulting in a “modest” charge of about $300 million
Later that day, in an interview with Bloomberg, Kavanaugh explained that those stranded costs related to staff left with nothing to do following the asset disposals and as a result, they would be laid off from the company.
In a statement, a spokesperson for IBM said it was important to note the charge is entirely related to the Kyndryl spinoff and healthcare divestiture.
Jan. 20: Google announces it's cutting 12,000 jobs globally
Google’s parent company Alphabet announced it was cutting 12,000 jobs, around 6% of its global workforce. An internal memo from Sundar Pichai said that he takes “full responsibility for the decisions that led us here.”
The company will be paying affected employees at least 16 weeks of severance and six months of health benefits in the US, with other regions receiving packages based on local laws and practices.
The news comes four months after Alphabet posted lower-than-expected numbers for its third financial quarter, where it fell behind both revenue and profit expectations. However, while overall revenue growth slowed to 6% in the quarter for Alphabet, Google Cloud grew 38% year-on-year to $6.9 billion.
Jan. 18: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella confirms plan to lay off 10,000 workers
On Jan. 18, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella confirmed in a blog post that the company would be cutting almost 5% of its workforce, impacting 10,000 employees.
The chief executive chalked up the downsizing maneuver to aligning its cost structure with its revenue structure while investing in areas that the company predicts will show long-term growth.
The Seattle-based tech giant reported its slowest growth in five years for the first quarter of its fiscal 2023, due largely to a strong US dollar and an ongoing decline in personal computer sales, causing net income to fall by 14% to $17.56 billion from this time last year. Rising cloud revenue helped to soften Microsoft's growth slowdown.
Jan. 16: Google-backed ShareChat lays off 20% of staff
Google-backed, India-based social media startup ShareChat said it is laying off 20% of its workforce to prepare for oncoming economic headwinds.
“The decision to reduce employee costs was taken after much deliberation and in light of the growing market consensus that investment sentiments will remain very cautious throughout this year,” a spokesperson said.
The move is expected to impact over 400 employees out of the company’s approximately 2,200 staffers. The company did not disclose the roles and the exact number of workers affected by the decision.
Jan. 13: Alphabet robotics subsidiary Intrinsic lays off 20% of staff
Alphabet, Google's corporate parent, also announced there would be layoffs at its Mountain View, California-based robotics subsidiary Intrinsic AI, eliminating around 20% of its workforce or roughly 40 employees.
“This (downsizing) decision was made in light of shifts in prioritization and our longer-term strategic direction. It will ensure Intrinsic can continue to allocate resources to our highest priority initiatives, such as building our software and AI platform, integrating the recent strategic acquisitions of Vicarious and OSRC (commercial arm Open Robotics), and working with key industry partners,” according to a company statement.
Jan. 12: Alphabet-owned Verily cuts 15% of workforce
Verily — a life sciences firm also owned by Alphabet and headquartered in San Francisco — is downsizing its workforce by 15% to simplify its operating model. The move comes just months after the company raised $1 billion.
According to an email sent by CEO Stephen Gillett to all its employees, the downsizing is part of the company’s One Verily program, which aims to reduce redundancy and simplify operational aspects within the company.
As part of the new One Verily program, the company said it will move from multiple lines of business to one centralized product organization with increasingly connected healthcare systems.
Jan. 11: Informatica to lay off 7% of its workforce to cut costs
Enterprise data management firm Informatica announced plans to lay off 7% of its total workforce through the first quarter of 2023, the company said in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.