Meta dismissals reach tech teams
Company cutting business-facing positions like HR and finance
Meta has begun to contact employees who are up for dismissal, as part of the cuts it announced last month.
Meta became the first major technology company to declare a second round of large-scale workforce reductions, in March.
The cuts are planned in three main batches spanning multiple months, and are expected to affect 10,000 employees.
Meta's cut 11,000 staff in November, equivalent to 13% of its workforce.
The move came before other large technology firms, including Microsoft, Amazon and Citrix, started slashing their headcount, following a hiring spree during the pandemic.
According to CNBC, Meta's second wave of job cuts at Meta specifically targets technical positions, including software engineers and user experience designers.
People employed as gameplay programmers, who work on the development of Meta's virtual and augmented reality products, have also been affected.
Cutting technical roles is a stage most other companies have not reached yet, focusing their first rounds of dismissals on business-facing positions like HR, legal and finance.
One former employee told CNBC that Meta will also be reducing these roles, starting in May.
Meta has indicated that even the tech teams previously not touched by the recent cuts may be subject to dismissals next month, the source said.
Mark Zuckerberg has designated 2023 as the "year of efficiency," during which the company will streamline its priorities and aim to be more productive.
"We closed last year with some difficult layoffs and restructuring some teams," Zuckerberg said in February.
"When we did this, I said clearly that this was the beginning of our focus on efficiency and not the end. Since then, we've taken some additional steps like working with our infrastructure team on how to deliver our roadmap while spending less on capex."
Zuckerberg vowed to eliminate middle management positions and expedite the company's decision-making processes.
Meta's business model, which depends heavily on advertising, has been affected by a series of shifts in advertising paradigms, including Apple's App Tracking Transparency.
In February, Meta announced a fall in its profits and revenue for its fourth quarter.
Meta's net income for the last quarter of 2022 was $4.7 billion - down 55% decrease from $10.3 billion in the previous year.
The company expects expenses for 2023 to range from $89 billion to $95 billion.
Despite this, the firm remains - on the surface - committed to its investment in metaverse initiatives, which it views as the next phase of mainstream computing.
However, reports say that it has now pivoted to promoting other products and services to advertisers - a hint that things are not going as smoothly as Zuckerberg might have hoped when he renamed Facebook in 2021.
Wall Street has reacted positively to the recent job cuts. The company's outlook for its just-ended quarter implies that the worst of the downturn may be over.
After experiencing a significant drop in value last year, Meta shares have surged by 81% this year. However, analysts are predicting another fall in sales for the first quarter, which Meta is set to report next week.
Meta is anticipated to benefit from a slight increase in the digital advertising market and regulatory scrutiny on its main competitor, TikTok.