2024 has just started and, unfortunately, as far as layoffs in the tech sector are concerned, no discontinuity compared to last year is being reported.
In the first weeks of January we gave you two pieces of news. Twitch, owned by Amazon, will lay off 500 employees, equal to 35% of its staff. And Google announced the first tranche of cuts: a few hundred employees. And we are talking about the “first tranche” because Alphabet’s overall plan should include reducing staff by 6%, and involve as many as 12,000 workers.
Now here we go again: eBay is firing, or is about to lay off, around a thousand employees, equal to 9% of the workforce. And other tech companies will make cuts. What do we know?
eBay lays off 9% of its staff
This is not a rumor but official news, published on the company website on Tuesday 23 January. And signed by none other than CEO Jamie Iannone: eBay fires around 1,000 employees, or 9% of the workforce.
Even if the title of the note, with all due respect to those who will stay at home, is turned positively: “Ensuring the long-term success of eBay”.
In the first paragraph of the note we read the successes achieved and the prospects for the future. In the second, it is mentioned that, however, there is a need for greater agility and speed of decision-making. And only in the third paragraph is the concrete news announced, that is, the fact that eBay is firing 9% of its full-time employees.
Here’s how eBay fires
Beyond the questionable way in which the news is provided, it is equally curious, so to speak, to read the way in which eBay will fire a thousand workers.
Since the notice will be given via Zoom, “We ask that all U.S. employees work from home on January 24 to ensure space and privacy for these conversations. We are committed to treating everyone with respect and empathy during this transition and providing affected employees with support and resources.”
In short: eBay employees will all work from home on January 24th. With the note that, for a thousand of them, that will be the last working day, and they will live with the anguish of seeing the Zoom icon appear on their computer monitor. And thank goodness we talk about “empathy”.
The future of eBay
Jamie Iannone explains in the note that, despite the company’s good performance, the costs were excessive. “To address this, we are implementing organizational changes that align and consolidate select teams to improve the end-to-end experience and better meet the needs of our customers around the world.”
The communication ends with the eBay CEO’s hope to see a “more focused, agile and reactive” company in the near future.better positioned to advance our goal of creating economic opportunity for all.”
TikTok cuts
eBay is firing people, and it’s not the only tech company doing so. ByteDance, owner of TikTok, had already cut hundreds of positions during 2023, however related to other companies.
Now a spokesperson has made it known that the much-discussed social network TikTok will be touched upon. 60 employees will be left without work, currently employed in the advertising and sales division. The club did not give reasons for its choice.
Riot Games: 530 employees at home
The third company to announce staff cuts in the space of a few hours is Riot Games.
Whose CEO, Dylan Jadeja, is at least more direct and explicit in his statement: “Some of the significant investments we have made are not paying off. We want to focus on fewer high-impact projects to move us towards a more sustainable future.”
And so, leaving 530 workers unemployed, the staff will be cut by 11%.
The company will close the Riot Forge label, founded in 2019, and Legends of Runeterra, a collectible card game that, Jadeja explains, “didn’t work as it should have.” The company has made it known that it wants to focus on its most impactful titles, such as League of Legends, Valorant, Teamfight Tactics and Wild Rift.
In the video game sector alone, there have already been more than 2,000 layoffs at the beginning of 2024.
