Google to let go 12,000 employees immediately

Reuters reveals that Alphabet, the parent company behind Google, is about to lay off some 12,000 employees across a plethora of divisions effective immediately. This is 6% of Google's total workforce, which is roughly 200,000 employees globally.

Allegedly, the information came straight from a memo written by Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai. Employees from all regions in which Google operates will be let go, the US included. 

The layoffs will reportedly involve various sectors and departments, like recruitment, corporate teams, as well as Google's own engineering and product divisions. However, it's not known if employees from the recently shut down Stadia cloud-gaming service are included in the total tally for the layoffs or not. 

"The fact that these changes will impact the lives of Googlers weighs heavily on me, and I take full responsibility for the decisions that led us here," reportedly reads Sundar Pichai's internal memo addressed to the affected staff.

As it usually happens, tech giants tend to expand their workforces rather rapidly in order to scoop up all the talent on the job market, but such economic downturns lead to the unfortunate necessity for job cuts. Google, Microsoft, and even Meta have been aggressively competing on the tech job market, head-hunting for all the promising engineers in the process of gradually expanding their rosters. 

The affected employees in the US have already been notified of the cuts, whereas it will take Google some more time to lay off staff in other regions due to different legislation and bureaucracy. 

These cuts come during a period of economic uncertainty and looming recession in the US. Another technological giant, Microsoft, is also laying some 10,000 employees this week. The cited reason for the layoffs, revealed by CEO Satya Nadella at the World Economic Forum in Davos, was the unfortunate slowdown of the global economy, which has affected nearly all walks of life. Just like Google, Microsoft is a pretty major employer, having a workforce of nearly 221,000 as of mid-2022.