Meta seems to be imitating the job cuts of Twitter, which created a fuss in the technology community.
The founder of Instagram and Facebook will start laying off employees next week, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Mark Zuckerberg of Meta previously said that the size of the social media behemoth’s workforce would decrease in 2023. One thing the business was concentrating on was optimizing office space.
Meta recorded approximately 87,000 employees two months ago in September, a period in which the enterprise stopped recruiting. Additionally, the corporation instructed its staff to postpone any non-essential travel from this week onwards. Thousands of people are anticipated to be laid off, and the formal confirmation might occur as soon as November 9.
The announcement follows as major IT companies battle to adapt to challenging times brought on by growth declining. A stock that had fallen significantly was Meta’s. Despite a Q3 revenue decline of 4%, expenses and costs increased by 19% YoY to exceed $22 billion in total. Furthermore, operating income, which was $5.66 billion in 2021, decreased by 46%.
Additionally, Meta’s operating margin decreased from 36% in 2021 to 20% in 2022, and Q3 net income decreased generally to $4.4 billion by 52%. The corporation was apparently tightening command over expenses and keeping an eye on head count in turn. In regards to its Q3 earnings, Zuckerberg stated in October, “So that means some teams will grow meaningfully, but most other teams will stay flat or shrink over the next year. In aggregate, we expect to end 2023 as either roughly the same size, or even a slightly smaller organization than we are today.”
On another note, at Twitter, cutbacks are far more severe. The microblogging site let off over 50% of its staff following Elon Musk’s acrimonious takeover, such as Parag Agrawal, the CEO, Ned Segal, the CFO, and Vijaya Gadde, legal affairs and policy chief, among many others.
Meta in the Metaverse
Due to the economic downturn in the advertising sector, Meta’s efforts in the metaverse have had a rocky beginning. Nearly $9 billion was lost in the three quarters of 2022 by its Reality Labs business, which is in control of the metaverse program that focuses on virtual and augmented reality. Although it could take some time for meteverse-related products to turn a profit, operating deficits in 2023 YoY are predicted to increase noticeably.
Just under 200,000 users each month likewise logged onto Horizon Worlds, Meta’s social virtual reality network, which is much less than the 500,000 MAUs anticipated. Since then, the corporation has changed their goal to 280,000 in light of the deficit.