Meta prepares a new wave of layoffs in 2023

Meta is preparing new waves of layoffs in 2023, which will take place in several waves throughout the year, after laying off 13% of its workforce worldwide at the end of 2022, or some 11,000 unemployed.

The new layoffs Meta is planning could be of a similar magnitude, according to a source close to the company quoted by the Wall Street Journal. It is speculated that the announcement of the new layoffs could arrive next week, although the total number this will entail is still unknown.

Among the workers affected would be those working in the Reality Labs division, which produces wearables and devices using virtual and augmented reality. Facebook also announced last week the closure of its experimental development division, NPE. Over the years, it has created many applications that were later closed or its developments were integrated into other social products of the company.

However, some of its employees will now be relocated to other divisions, but many could also be part of this new batch of layoffs that Meta is preparing. Susan Li, the company’s Chief Financial Officer, already showed last week at the “Morgan Stanley 2023 Technology, Media & Telecom” conference the company’s intention to undertake a new personnel readjustment. Even Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly said that 2023 will be a year of “efficiency” and that more projects will be closed within the company.

We will have to be attentive to this new wave of layoffs that Facebook is preparing and which will be added to those that other companies such as Amazon, Microsoft and Google have also announced in the first months of 2023. The technological crisis seems to be a reality since it the coronavirus pandemic has passed and already users are less reliant on the internet for work and socializing.

13,000 layoffs at Meta by the end of 2022

When Meta officially announces the dismissal of 11,000 of its employees, which represents 13% of its workforce, at the end of 2022, Mark Zuckerberg attributes this decision to the end of the pandemic and admits that he was wrong about the forecasts made on the evolution and its effects on user habits.

After a great empowerment of e-commerce that occurred during the pandemic, in Meta they prepared forecasts in which it was considered that this trend would have a permanent acceleration. Over time, the error of this forecast revealed itself. In the words of Zuckerbergit not only happened that e-commerce has returned to previous trends but also circumstances such as the global economic recession, increased competition and reduced advertising impact caused revenue to decline, less than expected“.

The CEO of Meta sang a my culpa indicating:

“I was wrong and I take responsibility“.

Until then, Meta’s workforce had reached 87,000 employees, having doubled over the past three years. In the years 2020 and 2021 alone, 27,000 new employees were hired mainly due to the increase in use and the growth forecast expressed by Zuckerberg.

This trend continued throughout 2022when hiring 15,000 new employeeseven if on this occasion it was the firm commitment to the metaverse, the virtual ecosystem in which Zuckerberg believes that digital interactions will take place in the near future, since the development of this virtual platform is the origin of these contracts .

After the layoffs, Meta’s workforce has been reduced to 75,000 employees, which continues to be an amount well above the numbers the company presented before the pandemic. However, the further layoffs that are expected in 2023 will once again significantly reduce the human capital strength of the company.

More information in the interview broadcast on Channel 24 hours with Manuel Moreno, director of TreceBits.com, on the dismissals at Meta.