Meta is not the only tech firm that has announced layoffs or is contemplating the same.
Billionaire Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced he will commence employee layoffs tomorrow, according to The Wall Street Journal. This is likely to be Meta’s largest employee layoff ever after eighteen years of existing as a company.
According to the report, Zuckerberg accepted responsibility for the company’s missteps in overstaffing.
By the end of September, Meta Inc had an estimated 87,000 employees. Consequently, the firm announced a hiring freeze. Zuckerberg has been accused of funneling money into the metaverse without a definite plan for success.
Meta has lost about $10 billion to its metaverse division, Reality Labs with about $3.7 billion of that coming in the third quarter alone.
Meta announced a pivot of its operations in October 2021, rebranding to show its renewed focus. With no plans to backtrack, the company is looking to trim its operating costs elsewhere by 10%.
Tech Firm Employee Layoffs
Meta is not the only tech firm that has announced layoffs or is contemplating the same. While the Twitter layoffs by Elon Musk have been the most publicized, others like Bitmex, Dapper Labs, Mythical Games, and Snap, have also announced varying degrees of layoffs.
Derivatives exchange BitMEX laid off 75 employees, amounting to 25% of its workforce, after a failed German bank acquisition. Similarly, Dapper Labs CEO Roham Gharegozlou announced a 22% staff cut-off. Snap also announced employee layoffs because of slowed growth.
Others like Amazon and Apple have also put in place hiring freezes. According to a KPMG survey from October, 90% of US CEOs believe a recession is on the horizon, explaining why several tech firms may be looking to trim their staff.
Meta’s Challenges
Meanwhile, Meta’s metaverse efforts have not yielded significant results since it went all out in October 2021.
While Zuckerberg projected that it will take years to transition to an immersive online experience, its flagship offering, Horizon Worlds, is not meeting internal performance expectations. Specifically, Horizon Worlds has not been able to attract the projected number of users.
Internal documents suggest that glitchy technology, uninterested users, and a lack of directional clarity are the leading causes of the struggle.
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