- Zoom employees are the latest tech workers to be hit by a wave of layoffs.
- In recent weeks, layoffs have spread outside technology, media and finance as Dow and 3M announced layoffs.
- Zoom is one of several major corporations that have already made significant cutbacks in the new year.
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Software company Zoom announced that it will lay off around 15% of its workforce.
The wave of layoffs that hit dozens of US companies in late 2022 shows no signs of slowing down in 2023.
The company exploded in popularity in 2020 as the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic saw an increase in the number of people working from home and isolated from each other, making Zoom’s videoconferencing feature a must-have for many .
Zoom CEO Eric Yuan said in a memo to employees that as the company grew, “it also made mistakes” and that included layoffs.
“It hasn’t taken us that long to dive deep into our teams or assess whether or not we’re making consistent progress toward top priorities,” he said.
Zoom is one of several major corporations that have already made significant cutbacks in the new year.
In the memo, Yuan also announced that he would cut his salary by 98% in 2023 and give up his corporate bonus.
In addition, other members of the executive leadership team will also take a 20% cut in their basic salaries this year, according to Yuan.
The Journal reported that the layoffs have mostly affected the tech sector, which is now losing workers at a faster rate than at any time during the pandemic.
Tech companies are expected to cut more than 150,000 jobs in 2022 alone, compared with 80,000 cuts in 2020 and 15,000 in 2021, according to data cited by Journal of Layoffs.fyi, a site tracking layoffs since the start of the pandemic.
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