With recession fears mounting-and inflation, the war in Ukraine and the lingering effects of the pandemic taking a toll, tech companies are rethinking their staffing needs, with some instituting freezes, rescinding offers and even starting layoffs. Here's a look at the dozens of companies that are pulling back.
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Alphabet: Google's parent company is decelerating all its recruiting. According to an internal memo, CEO Sundar Pichai told employees that "… although the business added 10,000 Googlers in the second quarter", it will be slowing the pace of hiring for the rest of the year and prioritizing engineering and technical talent. "Like all companies, we're not immune to economic headwinds," he said. The search giant had nearly 164,000 employees at the end of March.
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Amazon: Amazon.com said in April that it was overstaffed after ramping up during the pandemic and needed to cut back. "As the variant subsided in the second-half of the quarter and employees returned from leave, we quickly transitioned from being understaffed to being overstaffed, resulting in lower productivity," Chief Financial Officer Brian Olsavsky said. Amazon is subleasing some warehouse space and has paused development of facilities meant for office workers, saying it needs more time to figure out how much space employees will require for hybrid work. The company had 1.6 million workers as of March, making it the biggest employer in the tech world.
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Apple: Apple is planning to slow hiring and spending at some divisions next year to cope with a potential economic slump. But it's not a company-wide policy, and the iPhone maker is still moving forward with an aggressive product-release schedule. Apple had 154,000 employees in September, when its last fiscal year ended.
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Coinbase: Coinbase Global, a cryptocurrency exchange, told employees it was cutting 18 per cent of staff in June to prepare for a downturn. It also rescinded job offers. "We appear to be entering a recession after a 10+ year economic boom," CEO Brian Armstrong said in a blog post. "While it's hard to predict the economy or the markets, we always plan for the worst so we can operate the business through any environment." The company ended the quarter with about 5,000 employees.
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Gemini Trust: Gemini Trust, a cryptocurrency exchange founded by Bitcoin billionaires Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, announced a 10 per cent staff reduction in June.
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Lyft: Lyft, the ride-hailing platform, told employees it was reining in hiring in May, after its stock dropped precipitously. The company had about 4,500 employees in 2021. Lyft archrival Uber Technologies has been more upbeat. CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said that his company was "recession resistant" and had no plans for layoffs.
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Meta: Meta Platforms, the parent of Facebook, slashed plans to hire engineers by at least 30 per cent. CEO Mark Zuckerberg told employees that he's anticipating one of the worst downturns in recent history. The company had more than 77,800 employees at the end of March.
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Microsoft: Microsoft told workers in May that it was slowing down hiring in the Windows, Office and Teams groups as it braces for economic volatility. The company had 181,000 employees in 2021. More recently, the software maker cut some jobs - less than 1 per cent of its total - as part of a reorganization.
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Netflix: Netflix, the streaming giant, has had several rounds of highly publicized layoffs since it reported the loss of 200,000 subscribers in the first quarter. In April, it began scaling back some marketing initiatives, then cut 150 employees in May and 300 in June. Last quarter, it reported $70 million in expenses from severance and shed an additional 970,000 subscribers. Netflix had 11,300 employees in 2021.
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Niantic: Niantic, maker of the Pokemon Go video game, fired 8 per cent of its team in June. It was an effort to streamline operations and position the company to weather economic storms, CEO John Hanke told staff. Niantic had around 800 employees at the end of last year.
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Robinhood: Robinhood Markets, the online brokerage, terminated 9 per cent of its workforce in April. It had about 3,800 employees at the end of last year and racked up more than $2 billion of losses since going public last July.
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Spotify: Spotify Technology, the audio service, is cutting employee growth by about 25 per cent to adjust for macroeconomic factors, CEO Daniel Ek said in a note to staff in June. The company has more than 6,500 employees, according to its website.
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Tesla: Tesla, the electric-vehicle maker, cut 200 autopilot workers as it closed a facility in San Mateo, California, in June. CEO Elon Musk said earlier that layoffs would be necessary in an increasingly shaky economic environment. In an interview with Bloomberg, he said that about 10 per cent of salaried employees would lose their jobs over the next three months, though the overall headcount could be higher in a year. The company had 100,000 employees globally at the end of last year.
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Twitter: Twitter initiated a hiring freeze and began rescinding job offers in May, amid uncertainty surrounding Elon Musk's acquisition of the company, according to an internal memo obtained by Bloomberg. The company had 7,500 employees in 2021.
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