Swiggy lays off 380 employees, CEO apologises for the 'extremely difficult decision'

Swiggy became the latest company to announce the layoff of its employees. The company is firing 380 employees as part of its latest layoff process. The impacted people received emails from Swiggy that is planning to sack hundreds of employees. Earlier reports that surfaced in December, have said that Swiggy may lay off more than 250 employees or up to 5 per cent of its workforce, starting January.

The food delivery company's CEO Sriharsha Majety has given several reasons for the layoff and apologised for the decision that Swiggy has taken to reduce headcounts.

"We’re implementing a very difficult decision to reduce the size of our team as a part of a restructuring exercise. In this process, we will be bidding goodbye to 380 talented Swiggsters. This has been an extremely difficult decision taken after exploring all available options, and I’m extremely sorry to all of you for having to go through with this", the company's CEO said.

According to many media reports, Swiggy is planning to cut around 600 more jobs trimming its workforce by 8-10 per cent. One of the major reasons that the company has mentioned is the challenging macroeconomic conditions that it is facing. It revealed that the growth rate for food delivery has slowed down which has resulted in lower profits and reduced income. The executive has also blamed "overhiring" for its decision to layoff people. 

"Over the last year, under challenging macroeconomic conditions, companies around the world (public and private ) are adjusting to the new normal, with refreshed investment horizons and accelerated timelines for profitability. We’re no exception here and have already advanced our own timelines for profitability on food delivery and Instamart. While our cash reserves allow us to be fundamentally well positioned to weather harsh circumstances, we cannot make this a crutch and must continue identifying efficiencies to secure our long-term", the CEO said.

The CEO also explained that the growth rate for food delivery has slowed down, which is totally against the company's projections. So, the company had to revisit our overall indirect costs to hit our profitability goals.

The development at Swiggy comes just two months after Zomato fired around 3 per cent of its 3,800 workforces in November 2022.