2022: The year of massive layoffs. Which sectors were affected?

From Edtech to IT, several companies fired their employees in 2022.

With the weakened global economy, many tech companies laid off a big chunk of their workforce this year. Reasons have been demanded and everyone wonders about the feeble nature of their job security in such companies.

Ever since Elon Musk took over Twitter, the new season of layoffs began. Till now, more than 15,000 employees have been fired in different sectors.

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Take a look at the sectors and companies which fired employees in large numbers.

Social Media Giants

1. Twitter:

Musk never missed a chance to bring new unexpected changes to Twitter, impacting its users and workers.

From CEO Parag Agarwal to CFO Ned Segal, Musk fired nearly 50 per centof the total staff.

Thousands of employees were asked to leave globally, including in India.

Musk laid off employees via email without any prior notice.

In a rather strange development, two days after firing 50 per cent of its staff, Musk's Twitter Inc reached out to dozens asking them to return to their jobs.

2. Meta:

Facebook's parent company Meta executed one of the biggest layoffs of 2022 as over 11,000 employees were sacked.

Meta fired 13 per cent of its workforce. The employees were laid off via email, making it one of the biggest layoffs of the year.

Meta has laid off its staff from the United States, United Kingdom, Ireland, and Ghana.

Those sacked include product designers and engineers, as well as some who worked in recruitment, marketing, Meta's Reality Labs, and the Quest division.

Edu Tech

1. BYJU’s:

In October, Indian Education tech giant BYJU’s laid off around 2,500 employees as it was struggling to improve its finances and book profits.

India’s biggest Edtech start-up said the layoffs are a step to cut costs and achieve overall profitability.

In May 2022, due to higher promotion and employee expenses, BYJU’s reported a loss of 45.64 billion rupees ($ 554.77 million) for the fiscal year 2021.

2. Unacademy:

Edtech startup conducted three rounds of layoffs. The company sacked more than 1,000 employees in a bid to cut costs.

CEO Gaurav Munjal tweeted that Unacademy had brought down its monthly burn from $20 million to $7 million.

Apart from these two, Vedantu and FrontRow also laid off hundreds of their employees to cut costs.

Big Tech Companies-

1. Google:

Alphabet, Google's parent company is all set to lay off its employees. According to reports, the company will lay off up to 10,000 employees or 6% of the company's "poor-performing" employees.

According to a report, the IT giant will fire employees using a ranking system. In November 2022, the company announced a freeze on hiring.

Watch |Report: Google parent Alphabet plans to lay off about 10,000 employees

It will let go of ‘low performing’ employees in early 2023. The company will use performance as a parameter to fire employees by using a ranking system.

The new review system, which will depend on the fate of Google’s employees, will come into effect next year.
According to reports, even the top-performing employees will push harder to get the best rating possible.

2. HP:

Hewlett-Packard (HP), one of the biggest tech companies, joined the list of layoffs in November 2022.

The laptopand electronic gadgets manufacturing giant started laying off its employees and will continue to do the same till the fiscal year 2025. The company will stagger the layoffs in the coming years as part of its $1.4 billion cost-cutting plan.

Around 6,000 employees will be laid off from the company amounting to 12 per cent of its global workforce.

Currently, around 50,000 people are working at the firm.

3. Microsoft:

Microsoft Corporation has laid off thousands of employees across multiple divisions amid a global economic slowdown.

The tech giant didn’t confirm the number of cuts.

Fashion Labels-

H&M-

Stockholm-headquartered fashion label Hennes & Mauritz (H&M) fired around 1,500 employees citing lesser consumer demand due to soaring inflation.

H&M sells its disposable fashion in 53 countries worldwide. The current cuts at the company are aimed at saving $189.5 million per year.

Food Aggregators-

1. Zomato-

In the third week of November 2022, Indian food delivery aggregator Zomato confirmed that the company will lay off 3 per cent of its workforce nationwide.

“There has been a regular performance-based churn of under 3 per cent of our workforce, there's nothing more to it,” said the Zomato spokesperson.

In the last quarter, the company sustained a net loss of $2.5 billion.

E-commerce-

Amazon-

In November 2022, Amazon reportedly decided to lay off thousands of employees in a bid to"consolidate some teams and programmes."

There are also reports claiming that Amazon may fire 20,000 employees after over-hiring during the COVID-19 pandemic. Centre workers, technology staff and corporate executives are the ones who will be affected by the layoffs at the top-performing firm.

The employees who were fired shared their ordeals on Twitter.

Banking-

1. Goldman Sachs-

Goldman Sachs Group Inc(GS.N)is planning to lay off thousands of its employees to navigate a difficult economic environment.

According to sources, the number of employees that will be affected by the layoff is still being discussed and details will be shared by early next year.

Ahead of laying off 500 employees in the month of September, the investment bank already warned its employees in July of slow hiring and reducing expenses.

2. Morgan Stanley-

Global investment advisory firm Morgan Stanley has reportedly laid off nearly 2 per cent of its global workforce amid the global economic meltdown.

The firm laid off around 1,600 employees in the month of December.

Morgan Stanley’s layoffs come as a big surprise for its workers as most eyes were mainly on tech and startup layoffs.

The list does not end here, other big companies have also laid off their employees, like - Intel, Meesho, Ford, Walmart, TikTok, Snap, Netflix, Cars 24, Citigroup, Pepsico, Adobe, Barclays and more.

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