Google is the umpteenth technology company to be hit by a storm of layoffs. The search engine giant will lay off around 12,000 employees or the equivalent of 6% of its global workforce.
Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai announced the layoff decision via email to employees and he took full responsibility for this decision. Pichai said the layoffs would be global and company-wide.
"This is a critical moment to sharpen our focus, reengineer our spending base, and direct our talent and capital to the highest priority," Pichai said in his email, as quoted by Bloomberg, Friday (20/1/2023).
The bespectacled man added that artificial intelligence (AI) will be one of the company's important priorities going forward. Currently, Google is lagging behind in the AI sector, especially amid the popularity of OpenAI with the ChatGPT chatbot.
Pichai said Alphabet would provide 16 weeks of severance pay to employees in the United States affected by layoffs, and six months of medical benefits.
Employees in other countries will receive severance pay according to local regulations. Pichai added that the layoffs will not affect the bonuses that employees receive.
With this layoff, Google joins a number of other technology companies that are carrying out massive efficiencies amid uncertain world economic conditions and soaring inflation.
Microsoft just announced it will lay off 10,000 employees, while Amazon recently announced massive layoffs that will impact 18,000 employees. Other tech giants that have also cut their workforce include Twitter, Meta, Snap, Netflix, and many more.
Alphabet as Google's parent company previously also carried out small-scale layoffs at two other subsidiaries, namely Verily, a subsidiary in the health sector, and Intrinsic, a subsidiary focused on developing software for industrial robots.