Meta to lay off 10,000 more workers after initial cuts in November

Meta will lay off 10,000 more workers and incur restructuring costs ranging from $3 billion to $5 billion, the company announced Tuesday, with CEO Mark Zuckerberg warning economic instability could continue for “many years.”

Shares of Meta were up about 5.5%.

“Here’s the timeline you should expect: over the next couple of months, org leaders will announce restructuring plans focused on flattening our orgs, canceling lower priority projects, and reducing our hiring rates,” Zuckerberg said in a message to employees, which was also posted to Meta’s blog.

He added that the social media company plans to close 5,000 additional open roles that it hasn’t yet filled. In a nod to continued economic uncertainty, Zuckerberg noted that the company should prepare for “the possibility that this new economic reality will continue for many years.”

In a SEC filing announcing the cuts, Meta also said it anticipated lowered total expenses in 2023, ranging from $86 billion to $92 billion.

The new round of layoffs follows a previous round of cuts, announced in November, that affected more than 11,000 workers, which equated to roughly 13% of Meta’s overall staff.

Zuckerberg has pitched 2023 as the company’s “year of efficiency,” in which the firm aims to become “a stronger and more nimble organization.”

“We are a technology company, and our ultimate output is what we build for people,” Zuckerberg said. As part of the restructuring, the company will also increase the number of direct reports each manager has.

Zuckerberg told analysts in February that Meta plans “on cutting projects that aren’t performing or may no longer be crucial” while simultaneously “removing layers of middle management to make decisions faster.”

“A leaner org will execute its highest priorities faster,” Zuckerberg’s message said.

Still, Meta continues to spend billions of dollars developing the virtual reality and augmented reality technologies required to build the digital universe coined the metaverse. The company’s Reality Labs division that’s tasked with creating the metaverse lost about $13.7 billion in 2022 on $2.16 billion of revenue.

Amazon announced a new round of layoffs in January, impacting 18,000 employees across multiple divisions.

Twilio, Dell, Zoom and eBay also recently disclosed significant reductions to their workforce. In January, Google revealed plans to lay off more than 12,000 workers, Microsoft announced plans to cut 10,000 employees and Salesforce said it planned to cut 7,000 jobs.

— CNBC’s Ashley Capoot contributed to this report.

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