More details come out on which departments saw layoffs at Google, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and others

mood · Jan 21, 2023

By Richard Lawler @rjcc - January 21, 2023

Google’s decision to let go of 12,000 employees was only just announced on Friday, but it extended the recent trend of the “Big Tech” companies cutting jobs in previously unheard-of numbers, and now we’ve seen more reports about where those cuts happened.
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The Information reports that at Google, layoffs spread through nearly every group, including projects like Chrome, Search, Android, and Google Cloud. Its sources said they affected people who’d previously received “high performance reviews” and some managers making anywhere from $500K to $1 million.

Google confirmed to Bloomberg that it decided “to wind down the majority of the Area 120 team.”
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At Microsoft, where 10,000 people are being laid off, Polygon points out reports of the effects on several game development studios and the responses from some former employees. According to Bloomberg, there were cuts at Starfield developer Bethesda, and reporter Jason Schreier said in a tweet that its Halo studio 343 Industries was reportedly “hit hard.” At the same time, Kotaku noted that The Coalition, which works on the Gears of War games, was also affected.
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Amazon confirmed to us months ago that its layoffs included jobs in the devices and services division. Then, in early January, hardware chief Dave Limp said on CNBC’s TechCheck that the cuts affected nearly 2,000 people in his division, which is home to products like Alexa and its Echo smart home devices.

This week, CNBC reports the layoffs also include a “significant number” of employees working on the Prime Air drone delivery project at multiple sites, including its headquarters, and, according to a since-deleted LinkedIn post, as much as half the team at its Pendleton, Oregon test site.
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Update, 12:30PM ET: Updated to note the shutdown of AltspaceVR, as well as other layoffs in Microsoft’s mixed-reality division.
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mood · Jan 21, 2023

Area 120, Google’s in-house incubator, severely impacted by Alphabet mass layoffs
By Kyle Wiggers @kyle_l_wiggers - January 21, 2023

Area 120, the Google in-house incubator responsible for products such as Checks, Tables, Stack and ThreadBite, has been significantly affected by broader layoffs at Google parent company Alphabet. A spokesperson tells TechCrunch via email that the majority of the Area 120 team has been “winded down,” and that only three projects from the division will graduate later this year into core Google product areas.
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The spokesperson wouldn’t say which specific projects were being shuttered or graduating. Previously, Area 120 was incubating pilots like the workplace video platform ThreadIt, spectrum marketplace Orion, document scanner Stack, and more. At any given time, it usually had around 20 projects underway, though not all of them were made public.

“Employees in the U.S. who were affected have been notified [of layoffs at Area 120], but in other countries this process will take longer, and is subject to local laws and practices,” the spokesperson added. “Our managing partner of Area 120 remains at the company.”
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Area 120 was created by Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai in March 2016 with the goal of creating experimental apps and services that could be later folded into established profit drivers.

A source previously told TechCrunch that Area 120 had under 100 employees after the previous round of cuts. Google declined to confirm the number.
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mood · Jan 21, 2023

Here are the severance packages tech giants are offering sacked employees
Over 100,000 tech workers have lost their jobs since the year began
By Tudor Cibean - January 21, 2023

The big picture: Many tech companies saw record profits during the pandemic, which prompted them to increase investments and rapidly expand their workforce. However, with rising fears of a global recession, more and more have recently announced mass layoffs affecting thousands of employees.
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In the first three weeks of this year, over 100,000 workers in the tech industry have lost their jobs. A new report shows that severance packages vary greatly from one tech giant to another.

On Friday, Google parent Alphabet announced it was laying off 12,000 employees, about 6 percent of its global workforce. According to an SEC filing, severance packages for US employees include 16 weeks of salary and accelerated share vesting plus an additional two weeks for every year of employment at the company. Laid-off employees will also receive their 2022 bonuses, paid vacation time, and six months of healthcare.
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At the beginning of the year, Amazon confirmed it planned to let go of a record 18,000 employees, representing about 1.2 percent of its total workforce.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced last year that the company would cut over 11,000 jobs worldwide, about 13 percent of its workforce. Laid-off employees were promised 16 weeks' severance pay along with two additional weeks for every year of service.
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Twitter CEO Elon Musk initially planned to reduce headcount by 50 percent after he took over last year, though many more chose to quit rather than commit to the new "hardcore" work culture. Later, Musk claimed that everyone who left was offered three months of severance pay.
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CNBC: Here are the layoff severance packages Google, Microsoft, Amazon and other tech giants have promised

KEY POINTS

Google is the latest Big Tech company to reduce head count, laying off 12,000 employees.

Severance packages vary from company to company, ranging from the minimum legally required to longer-term packages that include health-care benefits and accelerated vesting.

Regardless, laid-off employees will enter an uncertain job market with reduced investor appetite for hiring and expenses at large-cap tech firms.

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EASTER · Jan 21, 2023

Interesting tidbit for everyone to keep an eye out for.

With the onset of those Layoffs coupled with laid-off employees, some with a variety of inside knowledge of the workings in Hi Tech, it might bare watching to see when (not if) some breaches or disruptions come about this year.

Daveski17 · Jan 21, 2023

EASTER said: ↑

Interesting tidbit for everyone to keep an eye out for.

With the onset of those Layoffs coupled with laid-off employees, some with a variety of inside knowledge of the workings in Hi Tech, it might bare watching to see when (not if) some breaches or disruptions come about this year.
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Yeah, revenge of the nerds!

mood · Jan 22, 2023

AltspaceVR is shutting down as Microsoft’s mixed reality division shrinks
By Emma Roth - January 21, 2023

Microsoft will shut down AltspaceVR, the social virtual reality (VR) platform it acquired in 2017 (via VentureBeat), on March 10th, 2023. The company shared the news in a blog post just days after it announced job cuts affecting 10,000 workers, stating the move will help shift focus “to support immersive experiences powered by Microsoft Mesh.”
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AltspaceVR emerged as one of the very first social VR experiences in 2015 alongside other platforms like VRChat and Rec Room. While the startup nearly shut down in 2017 due to financial issues, Microsoft scooped up the platform as part of its efforts to build out its own mixed-reality ecosystem. Microsoft says users can download their data from AltspaceVR before the shutdown.

“We look forward to what is to come, including our launch of Microsoft Mesh, a new platform for connection and collaboration, starting by enabling workplaces around the world,” AltspaceVR writes in its announcement.
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Microsoft has been gradually building upon Mesh since it first announced it in 2021, a platform my colleague Tom Warren says “feels like the future of Microsoft Teams.”

But now Microsoft’s scaling back on its metaverse ambitions as it looks to make adjustments to its “hardware profile.” The employees working on Microsoft’s open-source Mixed Reality Toolkit say they’ve all been laid off, and a report from Windows Central indicates that Microsoft cut the entire team behind AltspaceVR as well.
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In addition to the shutdown of Altspace, Microsoft’s massive layoffs also reportedly impacted the team behind the company’s HoloLens VR headset.
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mood · Jan 22, 2023

Halo developer says franchise is 'here to stay' after studio ‘hit hard’ by Microsoft layoffs
By Igor Bonifacic @igorbonifacic - January 22, 2023

Halo Infinite developer 343 Industries took to Twitter on Saturday to share a brief message about the franchise's future. “Halo and Master Chief are here to stay,” 343 said in a statement attributed to studio head Pierre Hintze. “343 Industries will continue to develop Halo now and in the future, including epic stories, multiplayer, and more of what makes Halo great.”

pic.twitter.com/03Xm3a9s59
— Halo (@Halo) January 21, 2023
The statement comes after Microsoft confirmed that it would lay off 10,000 employees before the end of March. According to Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier, 343 Industries was “hit hard” by the restructuring and lost Halo veteran and creative director Joe Staten – who joined the studio in 2020 to help bring Infinite over the finish line – to Microsoft’s publishing division.
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mood · Jan 22, 2023

Apple's slower hiring allows it to avoid wave of big tech layoffs
By Malcolm Owen @MalcolmOwen - January 22, 2023

Apple has managed to avoid joining the wave of mass layoffs at other tech giants, with its slower rate of hiring allowing it to avoid issues that Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon have run into with high employee headcounts.
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Following Meta's 11,000 job cut warning in November, the layoffs at tech giants has seen thousands go out of work. Microsoft is axing 10,000 employees, Google's doing the same for 12,000 employees, and Amazon's set to lay off 18,000.

In a profile in the Wall Street Journal, it is proposed that Apple has yet to join the rest of the group with a major layoffs round, due to a combination of a resilient business and a slower rate of hiring.
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As for its more direct workforce, there is still an expectation that Apple will try to reduce its headcount.

There is also the possibility that Apple could make cuts or changes to employee perks. It already doesn't provide free lunches to employees located on its corporate campus, something offered by Google and Meta to their workforces, but other benefit areas could face cost-reductions.
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mood · Jan 23, 2023

Google employees scramble for answers after layoffs hit long-tenured and recently promoted employees
By Jennifer Elias @jenn_elias - January 21, 2023

KEY POINTS

As Google announced a companywide layoff, employees said they unexpectedly found their access cut off.

Employees have rallied to find out who’s been laid off while demanding answers from leadership.

It comes as company leadership must confront the outspoken employee base who remains.

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Google employees are scrambling for answers from leadership and from colleagues as the company undergoes a massive layoff.

On Friday, Alphabet-owned Google announced it was cutting 12,000 employees, roughly 6% of the full-time workforce. While employees had been bracing for a potential layoff, they are questioning leadership about the criteria for layoffs which surprised some employees, who woke up to find their access to company properties cut off. Some of the laid-off employees had been long-tenured or recently promoted, raising questions about the criteria used to decide whose jobs were cut.
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The company provided an FAQ for the layoffs, which CNBC has seen, but employees have complained that it doesn’t give much detail on many answers. Employees have flooded Dory, the company’s question-asking platform, and set up virtual communities to figure out who’s been laid off and why.
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mood · Jan 24, 2023

Google’s Fuchsia OS was one of the hardest hit by last week’s layoffs
Fuchsia lost 16 percent of its employees, while the rest of Google cut 6 percent.
By Ron Amadeo @RonAmadeo - January 23, 2023

Google is still reeling from the biggest layoff in company history last Friday. Earlier cost cuts over the past six months have resulted in several projects being shut down or deprioritized at Google, and it's hard to fire 12,000 people without some additional projects taking a hit. The New York Times has a report about which divisions are being hit the hardest, and a big one is Google's future OS development group, Fuchsia.
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While the overall company cut 6 percent of its employees, the Times pointed out that Fuchsia saw an outsize 16 percent of the 400-person staff take a hit. While it's not clear what that means for the future of the division, the future of Fuchsia's division has never really been clear.

Fuchsia has been a continuous mystery inside Google since it first saw widespread press coverage in 2017. Google rarely officially talks about it, leaving mostly rumors and Github documentation for figuring out what's going on.
There's not much you can do with it on a locked-down smart display, so even after shipping, Fuchsia is still a mystery.
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The biggest mark against Fuchsia as a major project is that it's currently shipping to consumers, and Google has never said a single nice thing about it. The company could easily put together a "here's why Fuchsia is good" blog post and explain anything about the OS and why anyone would want it. Any public support would be a big deal, especially given Google's reputation for killing projects. The fact that public promotion has never happened suggests the OS could leave just as quietly as it arrived.
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mood · Jan 26, 2023

IBM cuts 3,900 jobs in latest round of big tech layoffs
By William Gallagher @WGallagher - January 26, 2023

IBM is firing approximately 1.4% of its total workforce, with the cuts coming from its IT services and healthcare groups.
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Following major layoffs from Amazon, Spotify, plus Microsoft and Google, IBM has announced its financial earnings, and revealed the redundancies.

According to the Wall Street Journal, IBM sales were flat in Q4, and reported revenue was down over $1 billion because of the strength of the US dollar.
Nonetheless, IBM posted a net income figure of $2.71 billion, higher than the $2.33 billion from the same period in 2021. Revenue was down, however, at $16.69 billion compared to $16.7 billion in the previous year.
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The approximately 3,900 jobs are to come from IBM's healthcare divestiture, and also the Kyndryl Holdings IT services business that was spun off in 2022.

While IBM did not discuss the reasons for its head count reduction, other big tech firms have cited both inflation and a return to pre-pandemic demand.
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So far Apple has chiefly managed to avoid major layoffs, although it has dropped an unspecified number of retail staff working for it in stores such as Best Buy.
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EASTER · Jan 26, 2023

So the big bubble begins to show signs of leakage.

mood · Jan 27, 2023

Google engineer says workers cried at meetings as the company laid off 12,000 employees
by Anushe Fawaz @NushesSrndipity - January 27, 2023

Last week, Google announced that it is laying off 6% of its workforce. With that, Google also became a part of massive ongoing tech layoffs which has resulted in thousands of people losing their jobs. Earlier this month, Microsoft laid off 10,000, and Amazon eliminated 18,000 employees. There are reports of Spotify’s plans to eliminate workers as well.
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On January 20, news broke out of Google eliminating 12,000 workers and added that these workers would get severance packages, six months of healthcare, and more. Nevertheless, the devastating news has been a lot for individuals to handle.

According to Business Insider, a Google Engineer, who wished to remain anonymous, shared insights on the effects of the downsizing on the existing workforce. The engineer mentioned the survivors of the layoffs cried during meetings when the news of the layoffs was announced.
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The engineer added that the typical interactions at the office between the existing staff had now changed saying "It's not the typical nonverbal interaction there used to be before. Now it's a meaningful nod."
A second engineer from the West Coast mentioned that the staff was “angry and sad” after the news.

The two engineers mentioned that the existing staff members fear further cuts. The East Coast engineer also said that some employees stayed a part of the company due to job perks which were also stripped down over time, and now, with the layoffs, “employment didn't feel as secure anymore.”
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mood · Jan 28, 2023

Why are so many tech companies laying people off right now?
Didn’t they just have record-breaking profits?
By Elizabeth Lopatto @mslopatto - January 26, 2023

There’s an eerie similarity to the statements tech companies have made about their recent layoffs. Mainly, if the press releases are to be believed, the C-suite of every Big Tech company on Earth — well, with the notable exception of Apple, which has not announced layoffs — figured no one would ever go outside or spend money offline again after the pandemic and their various online businesses would stay just as big as they were during the heights of covid.
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I do love a heavily lawyered statement that was clearly written by the public relations department! In fact, these are all so similar that they might as well have come from the same PR person. It kind of seems like tech firms are laying off workers because… other tech firms are laying off workers.

Let’s be real, none of these companies are teetering on the edge of bankruptcy — in fact, they were recently minting money. That money did not evaporate.
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The answer is that investors have changed how they’re evaluating companies, says Michael Cusumano, the deputy dean at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Generally, when companies are growing really fast — like when revenue is shooting up 20 percent or 30 percent a year — nobody cares about profits, Cusumano says. But we’re not in a growth period right now, so investors are being more cautious.
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Layoffs probably don’t cut costs, Pfeffer says. In fact, there is little empirical evidence that layoffs help improve profitability, and some evidence they actually hurt profitability, he says. “Oftentimes, companies don’t have a cost problem,” Pfeffer says. “They have a revenue problem. And cutting employees will not increase your revenue. It will probably decrease it.”
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mood · Jan 29, 2023

mood said: ↑

Halo developer says franchise is 'here to stay' after studio ‘hit hard’ by Microsoft layoffs
By Igor Bonifacic @igorbonifacic - January 22, 2023
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Phil Spencer says Microsoft will continue to ‘support and grow’ Halo amid 343 layoffs
By Igor Bonifacic @igorbonifacic - January 29, 2023

Xbox head Phil Spencer says Microsoft remains committed to the Halo franchise and developer 343 Industries. In an interview following this week’s Xbox and Bethesda Developer Direct showcase, Spencer told IGN “the heart and soul of Halo is with 343 and the team’s that there, and I have the utmost confidence in the team that's there and leading and the plan that they have going forward.”
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According to Spencer, the layoffs were an effort by Microsoft to position 343 for the future. “What we're doing now is we want to make sure that leadership team is set up with the flexibility to build the plan that they need to go build,” he said. “Halo will remain critically important to what Xbox is doing, and 343 is critically important to the success of Halo.”

Frustratingly, Spencer wouldn’t discuss the franchise's future beyond the broad strokes he offered. He declined to comment on whether Microsoft still has a 10-year support plan in place for Halo Infinite. “I'm going to let 343 talk about the plans that they have right now,” Spencer said when asked about the subject. However, he did offer reassurances for Halo fans left worrying about what comes next for Master Chief.
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mood · Jan 31, 2023

mood said: ↑

Phil Spencer says Microsoft will continue to ‘support and grow’ Halo amid 343 layoffs
By Igor Bonifacic @igorbonifacic - January 29, 2023
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343 is reportedly 'starting from scratch' on Halo development after layoffs
By Jon Fingas @jonfingas - January 31, 2023

343 Industries and Halo may be here to stay despite Microsoft's mass layoffs, but that doesn't mean it's business as usual for the franchise. Bloomberg sources claim 343 is effectively restarting Halo development between multiple changes that include the loss of "at least" 95 jobs, including directors and key contractors.

Notably, the studio is reportedly switching to Epic's Unreal Engine after both a leadership shuffle and struggling with its aging in-house platform (Slipspace) — it's even breaking from its familiar story-driven gameplay, according to the tipsters.
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Many of the laid off workers were crafting game prototypes in Unreal rather than producing new missions for Halo Infinite, Bloomberg says. 343 had considered switching engines for the past decade, the insiders claim, but it wasn't until studio lead Bonnie Ross and engine overseer David Berger left in late 2022 that the company committed to the change.
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mood · Jan 31, 2023

PayPal is laying off 2,000 employees
The cuts will affect 7 percent of the company’s total workforce.
By Igor Bonifacic @igorbonifacic - January 31, 2023

PayPal is about to become the latest tech company to lay off a substantial part of its workforce. The payments firm announced Tuesday plans to cut approximately 2,000 employees, a number that equates to about seven percent of its total staff. According to PayPal president and CEO Dan Schulman, the layoffs will occur over the next few weeks, with some parts of the company affected more than others.

“We will treat our departing colleagues with the utmost respect and empathy, provide them with generous packages, engage in consultation where required and support them with their transitions,” Schulman said. “I want to express my personal appreciation for the meaningful contributions they have made to PayPal.”
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The company joins a growing list of tech companies that have announced layoffs in recent months. Earlier this month, Google disclosed plans to lay off 12,000 employees, or about around six percent of its global workforce. Before that, Microsoft said it would cut 10,000 jobs. Schulman, like his counterparts at Microsoft, Google and other tech firms, blamed PayPal's layoffs on the “challenging macro-economic environment” the company finds itself in recently.

“While we have made substantial progress in right-sizing our cost structure, and focused our resources on our core strategic priorities, we have more work to do,” he said.
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mood · Feb 1, 2023

Amazon layoffs hit workers in robotics, grocery, health and AWS divisions
By Annie Palmer @annierpalmer - January 31, 2023

KEY POINTS

Amazon earlier this month began a fresh round of job cuts as part of widespread layoffs that are expected to total 18,000.

Following the announcement, an employee created a spreadsheet for people who lost their jobs that would be circulated to recruiters.

Staffers in Amazon’s AWS, health, Zappos, real estate and delivery businesses were among those hit with layoffs, the document shows.

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Amazon’s 18,000-plus job cuts announced this month are being felt broadly across the company’s sprawling operations, from physical retail technology and grocery stores to robotics and drone delivery, and even in cloud computing.

That’s according to a spreadsheet created after the layoff announcement by an employee, who has encouraged those affected to submit their information for use by recruiters. The database, which was circulated widely on LinkedIn, provides a window into the businesses hit with layoffs.
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CEO Andy Jassy wrote in a blog post in early January that “several teams” were impacted but that the cuts would primarily be centered in Amazon’s worldwide stores and human resources divisions. Beyond that, the company provided scant details on where downsizing would take place.

An Amazon spokesperson pointed CNBC to Jassy’s blog post on the layoffs.
Here’s a breakdown of where job cuts took place. CNBC verified that the staffers listed as Amazon employees worked for the company.
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hawki · Feb 4, 2023

"NSA wooing thousands of laid-off Big Tech workers for spy agency’s hiring spree

The National Security Agency is doggedly courting laid-off Big Tech workers as the spy agency undertakes one of its largest hiring surges in the last 30 years.

The NSA began privately reaching out to Big Tech employees over LinkedIn last fall, as word spread that major American companies such as Meta and Amazon were bleeding tens of thousands of skilled workers...

The NSA is currently hiring 3,000 new employees to work across the country..."

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/feb/3/nsa-wooing-thousands-laid-big-tech-workers-spy-age/

mood · Feb 6, 2023

Breaking: Tech Recession Hits Dell Hard with 5% Global Layoffs
By Shaun - February 6, 2023

Dell, a leading computer manufacturer, has announced plans to eliminate approximately 6,650 positions, which constitutes 5% of its global workforce, according to a report by Bloomberg. In a memo dated Monday, Jeff Clarke, Co-Chief Operating Officer at Dell, stated that the company has reached the conclusion that its prior cost-cutting initiatives, including a hiring freeze and restrictions on travel, have been inadequate, given the current market conditions that are becoming increasingly challenging with an uncertain future outlook.
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The job cuts were announced as a result of the declining demand for personal computers and laptops. With the PC market experiencing a significant surge during the COVID-19 pandemic, leading computer manufacturers are now facing a sharp decrease in demand. According to industry analyst IDC, Dell's computer shipments showed a 37% decrease during its recent holiday quarter, compared to the same period the previous year. Bloomberg reported that Dell generates 55% of its revenue from PC sales.

Following the layoffs, Dell's global workforce will be at its lowest level in six years, with approximately 39,000 fewer positions compared to the 165,000 full-time roles reported in January 2020, as reported by Bloomberg.
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Source: The Verge
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mood · Feb 7, 2023

Microsoft attempts to “provide clarity” on its HoloLens business after mass layoffs
By Kareem Anderson - February 3, 2023

Contrary to public perception, Microsoft COO and CVP of Windows and Devices Robin Seiler reached out to the HoloLens community via the company’s Mixed Reality blog to explain the project isn’t dead.
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According to Seiler, Microsoft remains committed to supporting HoloLens 2 and its Mixed Reality program as it currently stands.

Selier details monthly software updates will continue to roll out to enterprise customers via Dynamics 365 Guides and Remote Assist, as well as maintaining Microsoft’s Reality Toolkit through open-source contributions.

We continue to produce and support HoloLens 2, inclusive of monthly software updates to ensure our enterprise customers can leverage HoloLens 2 and the supporting platform to complete critical work.
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Selier also offers a bit of insight into what’s become of the company’s investment in AltspaceVR, which has been cannibalized by Microsoft Mesh.

Interestingly enough, Selier does not mention layoffs, or the skeleton crew Microsoft’s HoloLens team will be using to maintain all the support apparatuses listed above.
The entire post addresses the recent job cuts within the HoloLens business without explicitly saying so.
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mood · Feb 7, 2023

Zoom will lay off 15 percent of its workforce in the latest tech business cutback
By John Callaham @JCalNEO - February 7, 2023

Sadly, the tech industry has been hit again with news of a mass layoff. This time, the company is Zoom, which announced today it was letting go of 1,300 employees, or a big 15 percent of its total workforce.
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In a blog post, Zoom CEO Eric Yuan noted that in the last 24 months, Zoom added three times its previous employee workforce, as tons of companies started using its video conferencing software during the Covid-19 pandemic. Zoom calls became a normal way of life for a while, as employees stuck at home used the software to hold meetings with fellow employees.
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It's been a pretty brutal last few months in the entire tech industry as far as layoffs are concerned. Google, Spotify, Microsoft, and most recently Dell are just some of the major companies in the tech space that have reduced their workforce.
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mood · Feb 9, 2023

Yahoo laying off 20% of its employees, most of which belong to its ad-tech unit
by Anushe Fawaz @NushesSrndipity - February 9, 2023

Layoffs have become the new norm among tech giants. Today, Yahoo announced its plans to lay off over 20% of its employees in an effort to restructure its ad-tech unit.
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There have been several big companies like GitHub, Amazon, Google, and PayPal, among others who have recently eliminated thousands of employees from their workforces. Yahoo has joined the list and announced that around 1600 people, which is 50% of the company’s ad-tech unit, will be laid off.

In a report by Axios, Yahoo executives highlighted that the decision would be “tremendously beneficial for the profitability of Yahoo overall”. CEO Jim Lanzone suggested that the company hopes to invest its resources in more profitable parts of the business as he mentioned, “It was too resource intensive to do everything at once.”
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Lanzone also clarified that the decision to lay off employees was not attributable to financial challenges being faced by the company, instead, it is a strategic change, since, it eradicates Yahoo’s direct competition with Meta and Google for dominance in digital advertising.

With the current decision, Yahoo does not plan to exit the advertising business altogether. It aims to focus more on its demand-side platform, which will be renamed Yahoo Advertising.
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Source: Axios
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mood · Feb 9, 2023

GitHub lays off 10% and goes fully remote
By Frederic Lardinois @fredericl - February 9, 2023

The tech layoffs keep on coming. Microsoft-owned GitHub today announced that it is laying off 10% of its staff through the end of the company’s fiscal year. Before this announcement, which was first reported by Fortune, GitHub had about 3,000 employees. The company will also shutter all of its offices as their leases end, in part because of their low utilization, and move to a remote-first culture.
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GitHub will also continue its hiring freeze, which it first announced in January, and also make a number of other internal changes to “protect the short-term health” of its business.

“We announced a number of difficult but necessary decisions and budgetary realignments to both protect the health of our business in the short term and grant us the capacity to invest in our long-term strategy moving forward. You can view our CEO’s full message to employees with additional details on these changes below,” a company spokesperson told us.
He notes that he wants the company to become the “developer-first engineering system for the world of tomorrow,” with a strong focus on AI. Given GitHub’s recent focus on its Copilot and the overall shift at Microsoft toward AI-everything, that’s maybe not unexpected.
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GitLab: An announcement from GitLab CEO Sid Sijbrandij

February 9, 2023
Earlier today, GitLab CEO Sid Sijbrandij sent the following note to GitLab team members.
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mood · Feb 10, 2023

Some Microsoft divisions reportedly hit with more layoffs this week
By John Callaham @JCalNEO - February 10, 2023

In January, Microsoft announced plans to lay off up to 10,000 of its employees in order to cut costs. While some team members were given their notices that week, it looks like the company started a second round of layoffs this week as part of those previously announced plans.
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Windows Central reports that several divisions at Microsoft were greatly affected by this new layoff wave. It stated, via unnamed sources, that half of the company's Mixed Reality division was let go this week. That division is in charge of Microsoft's HoloLens hardware. Last week, the company published a statement saying it was committed to developing HoloLens 2. It's unclear if that situation has since changed.
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The Xbox division was also reportedly hit with more layoffs this week. That included some team members from the Xbox's ZeniMax Studios development team. It also affected team members who were working on some of Xbox's business and marketing teams.

The report also said the Surface PC hardware division completely got rid of its team that were in charge of establishing business partnerships. Again, it's unknown how this deep of a layoff will affect Surface going forward. Finally, the article claims Microsoft laid off an unnamed number of Windows software visual designers.
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