Google has announced it will lay off 12,000 employees from its workforce.
In a message sent by CEO Sundar Pichai on Friday, the company said the job cuts will affect employees across Google and its parent company Alphabet. Pichai has led the company in cost-cutting measures over the last six months, which has seen the company shut down or abandon various projects.
The job cuts affect 6% of the company’s workforce even as the CEO says he “will take longer due to local laws and practices.”
Reports have also said that employees have raised concerns about the criteria for layoffs as some were denied access to company properties without notice. Google employs over 160,000 full-time.
Tech companies are hard hit by the economic downturn at the moment with rising interest rates and inflation over the past year affecting shares forcing advertisers to cut back on online ad spending.
Amazon, Microsoft and Facebook have all undertaken similar measures as they fight to maintain business operations.
Pichai says that the company wants to “sharpen our focus, re-engineer our cost base and direct our talent and capital to our highest priorities. We hired for a different economic reality than the one we face today,”
Google is looking to invest more in AI products which is possibly one of the reasons why the company is reviewing its workforce.
“We’ve undertaken a rigorous review across product areas and functions to ensure that our people and roles are aligned with our highest priorities as a company,” Pichai added.
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