Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook will begin massive layoffs affecting thousands of workers this week, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Facebook (now known as Meta) is planning to begin layoffs this week, affecting thousands of workers. According to the report, the job cuts could take place as early as Wednesday. The WSJ said that the company has already instructed employees to cancel non-essential travel from this week.
In September, Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg revealed plans to reorganize teams and reduce headcount for the first time, citing a sharp slowdown in growth at Facebook and Instagram as the parent company. Zuckerberg said at the time that Meta would likely be smaller in 2023 than it was this year.
Zuckerberg told employees at a companywide meeting at the end of June: “Realistically, there are probably a bunch of people at the company who shouldn’t be here.”
Facebook, like other technology companies, hired a large number of people as business shifted online during the pandemic. The company hired 27,000 employees during that time, and 15,344 employees from January to September of this year.
Facebook’s share price has fallen 73 percent this year as the company struggles with growing losses and invests heavily in developing its metaverse business, which so far has not proved successful despite Zuckerberg’s dedication to the project.
The job losses in Silicon Valley are continuing to mount as a result of the recent layoffs at major tech firms including Twitter, following Elon Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of the social media platform. Ridesharing company Lyft Inc. and hard drive maker Seagate Technology have also announced plans to reduce their workforce or have already done so.
Read more at the Wall Street Journal here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan