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Meta Platforms Inc. is reportedly terminating employees, and the announcement could come any time this week. According to sources familiar with the matter, it will be massive layoffs described as the largest in the recent job cuts within the tech sector.
As per The Wall Street Journal, the terminations are expected to affect thousands of workers, and Meta may inform the employees as early as Wednesday this week. It was noted that Mark Zuckerberg’s company reported in September that it has more than 87,000 employees, but the exact number of those who will be laid off is unknown.
Insiders further said that as part of the layoff plans, officials of the tech firm had already told employees to drop any non-essential travel starting this week. This will be one of the momentous events in the company’s 18-year history because this is the first time that it is implementing a massive workforce reduction.
The scale is said to be a lot smaller compared to the recent job cuts at Twitter Inc. After Elon Musk took over the social media platform, he was said to have ordered the termination of almost half of the total number of staff.
Prior to this alleged large-scale layoffs, it was reported in September that Meta is cutting its expenses by at least 10%, and workforce reduction is one of the ways to achieve this. At that time, the company said this plan is taking effect in the coming months, so these reported job cuts are likely part of that scheme.
During the pandemic, most businesses have shifted online, and Meta has gone on a hiring spree as more people go online not only for entertainment and research but to operate businesses as well. The company hired 27,000 new employees from 2020 to 2021, and this year it added 15,344.
However, work is slowly returning to normal, and people are going back to offices, so some of the new recruits and roles are no longer necessary. Zuckerberg also admitted this in June by saying, “Realistically, there are probably a bunch of people at the company who should not be here.”
CNBC reported that Meta’s shares have dropped by 73% this year, and this has been its lowest since 2016. Meanwhile, the job cuts have yet to be announced despite information coming from people who are familiar with the situation in the company.
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