The US group currently employs 87,000 people.
(Photo: Bloomberg)
new York According to a media report, Facebook parent company Meta Platforms is planning mass layoffs this week. The layoffs will affect thousands of employees, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reports on Sunday, citing people familiar with the matter. An announcement is scheduled for Wednesday. Meta declined to comment on the report. Most recently, the group had 87,000 employees.
The descent at Meta continued recently. Profits fell by about half in the third quarter to $4.4 billion. That was the worst result since 2019 and the fourth straight decline. In addition, the online network posted the second drop in sales in a row. Revenues shrank four percent to $27.71 billion in the summer quarter.
The core business of advertising in online services such as Facebook and Instagram is generating less revenue than before. Because in view of high inflation and concerns about the economy, advertisers are more economical.
At the same time, the development of virtual worlds promoted by founder and boss Mark Zuckerberg under the keyword Metaverse is eating up more and more money. The stock price has been under pressure for months because investors find the Metaverse investments too high. Zuckerberg had recently announced that the number of employees at Meta could no longer grow for the time being and could also shrink in the coming year because the group would concentrate on fewer areas.
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In the last quarter alone, the Reality Labs division, which is working on the Metaverse, posted an operating loss of almost $3.7 billion. Since the beginning of the year, a deficit of 9.4 billion dollars has accumulated – with sales of 1.4 billion dollars in the area. And Zuckerberg announced that Reality Labs’ losses would “grow significantly” in the coming year.
Other tech companies like Microsoft and Snap have also cut jobs in the face of the economic downturn. The new owner of the short message service, Elon Musk, has partially stopped the widespread job cuts at Twitter.
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