LinkedIn announced job cuts affecting over 600 employees, which will take effect on 13 July, according to a report in the New York Post today. The report cited a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) filing indicating that LinkedIn informed 606 of its employees of permanent layoffs last week.
The announcement coincided with Meta's decision to lay off about 8,000 employees globally amid its aggressive artificial intelligence (AI) push.
Earlier this month, news agency Reuters reported that LinkedIn planned to cut about 5% of its headcount as it reorganizes teams and realigns personnel on areas where its business is growing. LinkedIn employs more than 17,500 full-time workers globally, according to its website.
The job cuts come as revenue at LinkedIn, which sells recruiting tools and subscriptions, rose 12% YoY in the quarter that ended on 31 March, according to Microsoft's securities filings. Microsoft acquired the professional networking platform in December 2016.
Locations and roles most affected
Layoffs predominantly struck LinkedIn's Mountain View office in California, where the company asked over 350 employees to leave. The company also sacked 66-odd remote employees based in California, laid off another 108 employees in San Francisco, 59 in Sunnyvale and 21 in Carpinteria.
The layoffs follow an internal memo from LinkedIn CEO Daniel Shapero sent last week and detailed in a report by Business Insider.
“We need to reinvent how we work, with agile teams focused on our highest priorities, and by shifting investments toward areas such as infrastructure to fulfill our mission and vision over the long term. This requires hard prioritisation and tradeoffs,” Shapero's memo reportedly read.
“Today I’m sharing the difficult decision that I, along with our leadership team, have made to reduce roles across GBO, Marketing, Engineering and Product,” he added.
LinkedIn is also reportedly reducing spending on marketing campaigns, vendor expenses, customer events and office space.
LinkedIn's parent company, Microsoft, has also announced buyout offers that could affect nearly 7% of its 125,000-person workforce or around 8,750 employees.
