Meta, Facebook’s parent company, has cut 10,000 jobs, as many as the social media company announced late last year in its first round of cuts, as uncertainty about the global economy hits the tech sector especially hard.
The company announced 11,000 job cuts In November, about 13% of its workforce at that time. In addition to the layoffs, Meta said Tuesday that it will no longer fill 5,000 job vacancies.
“This is going to be tough and there is no way around that,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said.
Meta and other tech companies have been hiring aggressively for at least two years and in recent months have started letting some of those workers go. U.S. employment remains strong, but layoffs have hit hard in some sectors.
Early last month, Meta posted declining profits The third consecutive quarter of declining revenue. On the same day, the company said it would buy back up to $40 billion of its shares.
Menlo Park said Tuesday it will reduce the size of its hiring team and make further cuts to its technology groups in late April, and then its business groups in late May.
Zuckerberg invested tens of billions of dollars in building his metaverse, the virtual reality concept, and renamed the company Meta, signaling a new focus for Facebook.
“As I talked about efficiency this year, I said that part of our work will include eliminating jobs — and that will be in the service of building a more agile, more technical company and improving our business performance to enable us to see the range,” Zuckerberg said.
The biggest tech companies in the US are cutting costs elsewhere, too.
This month, Amazon paused construction on its second headquarters In Virginia after the largest round of layoffs in the company’s history and its changing plans around remote work.
Global inflation has remained stubborn and made for more difficult decisions for both households and businesses in the United States.
Fast-growing companies, including many in the technology sector, are heading into what could be a prolonged period of adverse economic conditions.
“At this point, I believe we should prepare ourselves for the possibility that this new economic reality will continue for many years,” Zuckerberg said in a letter to employees.
Meta shares rose nearly 7% on Tuesday.