Facebook and Instagram owner Meta to lay off thousands of staff from this week, reports say
- Job cuts could come as early as Wednesday – the company has already told employees to cancel non-essential travel from this week
- The redundancies will add to already mounting job losses in Silicon Valley after Twitter slashed nearly 3,700 positions last week
Meta Platforms is planning to begin lay-offs that will affect thousands of workers from this week, Wall Street Journal reported, citing people with knowledge of the matter.
The job cuts could come as early as Wednesday, the newspaper said. The company has already told employees to cancel non-essential travel from this week, according to the report.
Meta shares rose 3.8 per cent to US$94.20 as trading got under way in New York on Monday. The stock has declined about 73 per cent for the year through Friday.
Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg in September outlined plans to reorganise teams and reduce headcount for the first time, following a sharp slowdown in growth at the parent of Facebook and Instagram. Zuckerberg said then that Meta is likely to be smaller in 2023 than it was this year.
The lay-offs come as Meta struggles with growing losses and as it invests heavily in developing its metaverse business.
“Meta may seek at least US$3 billion to US$4 billion in opex reductions through lay-offs and fixed-cost cuts to bring its view closer to the lower end of its expense guidance of US$96 billion to US$101 billion,” Bloomberg Intelligence Analyst Mandeep Singh wrote in a note on Monday.
The cuts will add to already mounting job losses in Silicon Valley. Twitter last week slashed nearly 3,700 positions after Elon Musk completed his US$44 billion takeover of the social media platform. Other companies that have also reduced their workforce or announced plans to include ride-hailing firm Lyft and hard drive maker Seagate Technology.
A spokesman for Meta declined to comment to the WSJ.
