Salesforce began notifying employees of a new round of redundancies sweeping through its artificial intelligence, IT integration and marketing software divisions. A California regulatory filing, cited by Business Insider, confirmed that 86 positions have been eliminated. Internal documents quoted in the BI report revealed that eligible US employees stand to receive severance packages worth up to 30 weeks of pay.
Salesforce layoffs hit Agentforce, Mulesoft and Marketing Cloud teams
The job cuts have affected staff working on Agentforce, the company's flagship artificial intelligence product, its Mulesoft IT integration platform and its Marketing Cloud software. A Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) filing in California listed 86 roles across sales, general administration and technology and product functions.
The new round follows an earlier set of redundancies in January, when the company eliminated fewer than 1,000 positions. Salesforce employed more than 80,000 people at the end of January, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Salesforce stock is down more than 30% this year as AI competition intensifies
The workforce reductions come as Salesforce faces mounting investor concern that large language models, AI tools and autonomous agents could erode demand for traditional enterprise software, including its core customer relationship management platform. The company's stock has shed more than 30% of its value this year as those anxieties have deepened.
Salesforce has accelerated its own artificial intelligence development in response. In November, Business Insider reported that usage of Agentforce remained relatively low and that its capabilities had not lived up to the company's promotional demonstrations. Despite that, the product has registered tangible commercial progress: last month, Salesforce disclosed that annualised Agentforce revenue had crossed $1 billion.
Salesforce severance package for laid-off employees can reach 30 weeks of base pay
Internal documents reviewed by Business Insider show that Salesforce's standard severance plan provides laid-off US workers with a comparatively substantial financial cushion. The policy calculates entitlements based on a combination of seniority, length of service and age.
Senior directors and director-level employees receive 13 weeks of base pay. Senior managers and those below receive nine weeks. Workers aged 60 and older at any level receive four additional weeks on top of their standard entitlement.
Employees also receive three additional weeks of service for each year of service, with any partial year counted as a full year. The combined level- and tenure-based total is capped at 26 weeks, rising to 30 weeks for those aged 60 and above. All eligible US workers receive six months of COBRA healthcare continuation coverage, with those aged 60 or older receiving 12 months.
How Salesforce's severance compares with Oracle, Amazon and Block
The Salesforce package appears more generous than recent offers from several prominent technology employers. Oracle recently provided laid-off US employees with four weeks of base salary plus one additional week per year of service, capped at 26 weeks in total.
Block, which laid off close to half its workforce earlier this year, extended 20 weeks of salary, alongside one additional week per year of tenure. Amazon, which notified employees of redundancies in January, offered full pay and benefits for 90 days, followed by a further severance payout.
