Facebook’s umbrella organization Meta will be laying off 11,000 employees, about 13 percent of the company’s workforce. It will also reduce discretionary spending and extend its hiring freeze for the next quarter.
Mark Zuckerberg CEO of the company, shared the news and said that the decision was one of the most difficult in Meta’s recent history.
“IÂ accept responsibility for the decisions made and how we got there. He wrote that he understood how difficult this was for everyone and that he was particularly sorry for those affected.
Zuckerberg blames his reaction to the COVID pandemic for “outsized revenue growth” in the post.
This decision follows a drop in revenue and a sharp fall in stock price. Zuckerberg’s insistent investment of billions partly fueled the drop into the virtual reality ecosystem called the metaverse.
However, Zuckerberg didn’t give up on the metaverse. The note announcing his layoffs stated, “We have shifted more resources onto a lower number of high-priority growth areas — such as our AI discovery engine, business channels, and our long-term vision for the metaverse.”
On Wednesday, most of those fired lost access to Meta systems. Zuckerberg claims this was because they had “a lot of access to sensitive data.” They will receive 16 weeks of severance and two additional weeks for every year of service. Additionally, they will be paid any remaining PTO time. Their healthcare coverage for their family for six months and other support measures.
Zuckerberg spoke out about what he plans to do next. He said the company would share more information on how it will continue moving forward in the coming weeks.
