Tag: layoffs

eBay Could Be Considering Exiting NFT Sector, Reportedly Trims Web3 Team

eBay, the US-based ecommerce giant, is reportedly planning to bow out of the NFT space. As per reports, the platform has trimmed its Web3 team by 30 percent this week. While not a lot is known about eBay’s reported decision, some drama seems to have unfolded between eBay and the NFT marketplace KnownOrigin that it acquired in 2022. During the acquisition at the time, eBay was looking at establishing itself as a notable player in the NFT arena.

In the past few weeks, some senior officials from eBay tendered their resignations. Stef Jay, eBay’s business and strategy officer and one of KnownOrigin founders, David Moore – both have not been actively associated with the company for some weeks, as per a report by CoinGape.

After acquiring KnownOrigin, eBay absorbed the team running the NFT marketplace. The plan was to expand and build on partnerships that were already working with KnownOrigin. In the last eighteen months since the acquisition however, tensions between the eBay team and the KnownOrigin team reportedly rose. The information was disclosed in a report published by NFTGators, citing an anonymous source familiar with the matter.

“Many within the company are unhappy, blaming the lack of leadership and strategy for the layoffs. There are internal criticisms, even at senior levels, questioning the qualifications of the current head of Web3 as well as eBay’s strategy team,” the report quoted the source as saying.

In what seems like an internal communication, Moore informed his teammates that he has been impacted by the latest round of proposed redundancies in the company.

“Witnessing that level of layoffs within the team was brutal,” Moore said in his message – a screenshot of which has been published as part of the report by the NFTGators.
As of now, eBay has not addressed the situation. It remains unclear if these layoffs by eBay are part of an internal restructuring. Afterall, the overall NFT market recorded an all-time low in sales in 2023.

The sales of NFTs peaked in September 2021 when sales of these digital collectibles managed to amass around $881 million (roughly Rs. 7,344 crore). However, as of November 2023, NFT sales only managed to bring-in $10.85 million (roughly Rs. 90 crore).

Members of the KnownOrigin team have also not addressed the situation on any public domain as of now. eBay is planning to lay off a thousand more employees. This information was circulated to the eBay team by CEO Jamie Iannone in January.

“The most significant and toughest of these decisions is to reduce our current workforce by approximately 1,000 roles or an estimated nine percent of full-time employees. Additionally, we plan to scale back the number of contracts we have within our alternate workforce over the coming months,” the official note had said at the time.

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Sports Illustrated’s entire staff told they are getting laid off

It is a dark day for sports journalism.

The Arena Group alerted all Sports Illustrated staffers on Friday that their positions were being eliminated.


A George Mason fan holds up a Sports Illustrated magazine in 2006. AP

Richard Deitsch, a sports media reporter who left for Sports Illustrated for the Athletic, posted the email that all employees received on X.

It noted, in part, that some employees would be “terminated immediately.”

The decision comes after the Authentic Brands Group, the licensing group that bought Sports Illustrated for $110 million from Meredith five years ago, terminated the agreement it holds with The Arena Group to publish the magazine in print and digital, per Front Office Sports.

“Some employees will be terminated immediately, and paid in lieu of the applicable notice period under the [the union contract],” the notice read. “Employees with a last working day of today will be contacted by the People team soon. Other employees will be expected to work through the end of the notice period, and will receive additional information shortly.”

The Arena Group missed a $2.8 million payment that breached the company’s Sports Illustrated licensing deal three weeks ago.

It is unclear whether Authentic will establish a new operator or allow Arena to renegotiate its current deal.

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Near Protocol Crops Work Force Marking 2024’s First Layoff in Web3: Details

The first two weeks of 2024 saw major upheaval with the excitement around the approval of BTC ETFs in the US. The market volatility seems to be cooling off now that the ETFs have been approved – but regardless, a fresh setback has hit the crypto sector. The Near Foundation has decided to lay off 40 percent of its work force as part of an internal restructuring. A non-profit organisation based in Zug, Switzerland, the Near Foundation manages open-source Web3 projects based on the NEAR Protocol blockchain.

In an announcement made on January 11, Near Protocol said it was letting go of 35 employees from its marketing, business development, and community teams.

Explaining its decision, the foundation said, “with the NEAR Foundation Council (NFC), we’ve conducted a thorough review of the Foundation’s activities. During this process, we heard feedback that the Foundation has not always been as effective as it could be, sometimes moving too slowly and trying to do too many things at once.”

It is noteworthy that Near Protocol has not reported any losses in 2023. On the contrary, the Near Protocol, as per a DapperLabs report, emerged third on a list of top ten blockchains by Unique Active Wallets (UAWs) in 2023. The UAW is a term of measurement in the Web3 that represents the number of crypto wallets that were linked with dApps or saw transactions of digital assets over a period of time.

As per the foundation, its treasury remains strong with over $285 million (roughly Rs. 2,362 crore) in fiat, 305 million NEAR tokens worth over $1 billion (roughly Rs. 8,291 crore), along with $70 million (roughly Rs. 580 crore) allocated to investments and loans.

The foundation, with this round of layoffs, has decided to significantly consolidate its core team to focus on a narrower and higher-impact set of activities.

“The Near Foundation will provide support to affected colleagues during this time to help them find new opportunities in the NEAR ecosystem, the Web3 industry, and beyond,” the foundation has vouched.

Meanwhile, the Near Protocol has managed to rope-in a bunch of promising projects under its belt in 2023. In November, South Korean metaverse platform Zep announced a new partnership with Near Protocol, ushing which it aims to create online games in the metaverse ecosystem and onboard more users onto its platform.

Aiming to foster the growth of Web3 in Asia, the Near Foundation also entered a partnership with China’s Alibaba Group in June 2023.

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CoinSwitch Cites Drop in User Queries for Trimming Customer Support Team: Details

The global crypto market, that is currently undergoing a slump, could be losing community members who do not have an appetite for risky investments at the time. This impact of the slowdown has been highlighted by crypto exchange CoinSwitch after it laid off 44 employees earlier this month from its customer support team due a drop in customer queries. The company is now among many facing the brunt of dealing with volatile assets such as cryptocurrencies, especially in the lack of rules and regulations dedicated to overseeing the sector.

Founded in 2017, CoinSwitch is a Bengaluru-based crypto exchange that claims to be catering to over 18 million users. “Queries from our users have dropped to just ten percent of what they used to be around a year ago. People who have been reaching out to us, usually tend to have questions regarding their KYC verifications,” a company official told Gadgets 360.

“We continuously evaluate our business to stay competitive, prioritizing innovation, value, and service for our customers. To that end, we right-sized our customer support team to align with the present volume of customer queries on our platform. This impacted the roles of 44 members of our customer support team, who voluntarily resigned from their roles after a detailed discussion with their managers earlier this month,” a company spokesperson said on Tuesday.

“Over the last year, many support team members have been absorbed into other functions based on the suitability of their skills for the other roles. We are extending all our support to the impacted employees. As and when volumes grow and we open new roles, we will be happy to welcome back those impacted.”

Back-to-back interest rate hikes in the US as well as the consecutive targeting of crypto players like Binance and Coinbase by the SEC in the US, have also acted as factors that slowed down the market momentum for cryptocurrencies in recent months. Currently, the overall cap of the crypto market stands at $1.05 trillion (roughly Rs. 86,80,402 crore), hanging by a thread to the psychologically significant trillion-dollar mark.

Earlier this month, India’s CoinDCX crypto exchange announced the layoff of 12 percent of its workforce, blaming the country’s tax regime for pushing investors away.

The crypto exchange, in its official statement, said that India’s TDS (Tax Deducted at Source) deductions on each crypto transaction has slowed down its business, especially during the ongoing bear market. A total of 71 people lost their jobs at CoinDCX during the recent round of layoffs.

On an international level, KuCoin, Binance, Genesis, and Huobi also laid off staff members between January and August this year succumbing to market pressure.

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Reddit Lays Off 5 Percent of Its Workforce, Will Reduce Planned Hiring for 2023

Reddit said on Tuesday it is laying off about 5 percent of its workforce, or 90 employees, joining a list of technology companies that have been cutting jobs across corporate America.

Tech companies including Meta Platforms have been slashing jobs after aggressively hiring during the pandemic, as the industry braces for an economic downturn.

Meta, the owner of Facebook, slashed jobs across its business and operations units last month, as it carried out its last batch of a three-part layoff round, first announced in March to eliminate 10,000 roles.

Reddit, which was spun off from magazine conglomerate Conde Nast in 2011, saw a recent surge in appeal due to the popularity of WallStreetBets and other forums on its platform that have become a venue for retail investors to speculate on stocks.

The Wall Street Journal first reported Reddit’s move on Tuesday, citing an email sent to employees from Chief Executive Steve Huffman.

Huffman said the company would also reduce its hiring for the rest of the year to about 100 people from an early plan of 300, according to the WSJ report.

In December 2021, Reddit had confidentially filed for an initial public offering with the US securities regulator after the company’s message boards became the go-to destination for day traders during a meme stock frenzy.

The company was looking at a valuation of more than $15 billion (roughly Rs. 1,14,380 crore), Reuters had reported in September 2021.

Earlier that year, the company was valued at $10 billion (roughly Rs. 76,260 crore) in a private fundraising round.

Reddit was also reportedly tapping Wall Street banks Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs Group for its initial public offering.

Reddit, which was founded in 2005 by Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian, has more than 50 million daily active users and over 100,000 communities.

© Thomson Reuters 2023

The Motorola Edge 40 recently made its debut in the country as the successor to the Edge 30 that was launched last year. Should you buy this phone instead of the Nothing Phone 1 or the Realme Pro+? We discuss this and more on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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Netflix Plans to Cut Spending by $300 Million; No Layoffs Expected: Report

Netflix plans to cut its spending by $300 million (nearly Rs. 2,465 crore) this year, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter.

Company leaders urged staffers to be judicious with their spending, including in relation to hiring, but said there would be no hiring freeze or additional layoffs, according to the report.

Netflix declined to comment. Shares of the company were down nearly 2 percent in early trading.

Last month, Netflix beat estimates for first quarter but offered a lighter-than-expected forecast, demonstrating the challenges it faces in pursuit of growth.

The company said it shifted a wider launch of a plan to crack down on unsanctioned password sharing into the second quarter to make improvements.

As the streaming video pioneer faces signs of market saturation, it is exploring new ways to make money, such as password crackdown and a new ad-supported service.

Netflix in June also laid off 300 employees, or about 4 percent of its workforce, in the second round of job cuts aimed at lowering costs.

The company is also facing some trouble in India as the government here is seeking to tax the OTT platform for income earned from streaming services in the country, the Economic Times reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

In a draft order, income tax authorities attributed an income of about Rs. 550 million rupees to Netflix’s Indian permanent establishment (PE) in the assessment year 2021-22, the report added.

Tax officials reasoned that the US firm had some employees and infrastructure from the parent entity on secondment in India to support its streaming services, leading to a PE and tax liability, the publication reported.

Smartphone companies have launched many compelling devices over the first quarter of 2023. What are some of the best phones launched in 2023 you can buy today? We discuss this on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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Meesho Lays Off 15 Percent of Its Workforce to Cut Costs, Achieve Profitability

E-commerce firm Meesho has laid off 251 employees constituting 15 per cent of its workforce to cut costs and as part of its efforts to achieve profitability, a top company official said on Friday.

Meesho Founder and CEO Vidit Aatrey in an email to employees informed about the decision and announced that all the affected employees will get one month extra severance pay beyond the notice period as well as ESOPs irrespective of the period they have been with the company.

“We are reducing the size of the Meesho workforce by 15 per cent, affecting 251 employees,” Aatrey said in an internal email.

He said that the company grew 10 times from 2020 to 2022 which was aided by Covid tailwinds and aggressive investments.

“Even as we tracked our plans, the macro climate undeniably and considerably changed. As a result, we have had to accelerate our timeline to profitability as part of Project Redbull, while readjusting our GMV growth goals to 30 per cent YoY.

“While our cash reserves buffer us well for these harsh circumstances, we need to stay highly prudent on the cost front,” Aatrey said.

A recent report by Jefferies had said that Meesho is already contribution-margin positive (pre-marketing and indirect spends) and the company is nearing zero cash burn and is on track to achieve EBITDA breakeven this year.

When contacted, the company spokesperson said: “We have taken a difficult decision to part ways with 251 Meeshoites constituting 15 per cent of the employee base, as we look to work with a leaner organizational structure to achieve sustained profitability.” The spokesperson said that the company is committed to ensure all those impacted have its full support and will be provided a separation package that includes a one-time severance payment of 2.5 to 9 months (depending on tenor and designation), continued insurance benefits, job placement support and accelerated vesting of ESOPs.

“We remain grateful for their contributions in building Meesho,” the spokesperson said.

OnePlus recently launched its first tablet in India, the OnePlus Pad, which is only sold in a Halo Green colour option. With this tablet, OnePlus has stepped into a new territory that’s dominated by Apple’s iPad. We discuss this and more on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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Accenture to Cut 19,000 Jobs Amid Concerns of Lower IT Spending Due to Global Economic Outlook

Accenture on Thursday lowered its annual revenue and profit forecasts and said it would cut about 2.5 percent of workforce, or 19,000 jobs, the latest sign that the worsening global economic outlook was sapping corporate spending on IT services.

More than half of the layoffs will affect staff at its non-billable corporate functions, the company said, sending its shares up more than 4 percent before the bell.

Accenture now expects annual revenue growth to be between 8 percent and 10 percent compared to the previous projection of 8 percent to 11 percent increase.

Last month, rival Cognizant Technology Solutions pointed to “muted” growth in bookings, or the deals IT services firms have in the pipeline, in 2022 after its first-quarter revenue forecast came in below market expectations.

Accenture said it now expects earnings per share to be in the range of $10.84 to $11.06 (roughly Rs. 890 to Rs. 900) compared to $11.20 to $11.52 (roughly Rs. 920 to Rs. 940) previously.

Meanwhile, US-based job search platform Indeed said on Wednesday it will cut about 2,200 jobs, or 15 percent of its workforce, joining a host of companies rationalizing their labour force following a pandemic-fuelled hiring boom.

Chief Executive Chris Hyams, who will take a 25 percent cut in base pay, said future job openings in general were at or below pre-pandemic levels and that the company was too large.

Corporate America has been laying off staff at a pace not seen since the financial crisis over a decade ago, bracing for an economic downturn triggered by aggressive rate hikes by central banks around the world.

© Thomson Reuters 2023
 

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Microsoft Announces Up to 10,000 Job Cuts, to Invest in Strategic Areas to Remain Competitive

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has announced up to 10,000 job cuts, with notices going out to affected employees as early as today. In a memo circulated to staff and published online, Nadella outlined the economic conditions that are forcing “hard choices” such as this, but stated that Microsoft will continue to invest in “strategic areas” for its future. The total number of employees to be laid off represent less than five percent of Microsoft’s total workforce, according to Nadella. The layoffs were anticipated, with rumours leaking earlier today. As per reports, Microsoft had 221,000 employees as of June 2022, with 99,000 of those outside the US. Other large tech companies including Twitter, Amazon and Meta have also laid off significant numbers of employees recently thanks to a global economic downturn.

In the company-wide memo, Nadella cited reduced consumer spending as the COVID-19 pandemic has become less severe, and the fact that many parts of the world are facing economic recession. The layoffs are necessary to align cost structures with projected revenue, and Microsoft will continue to hire new resources where needed. While some affected employees will be notified immediately, the process is expected to be complete only by Q3 2023. 

Promising to treat all employees “with dignity and respect”, and act transparently, Nadella committed to helping those laid off in terms of adequate notice periods, career transition services, continuing employment benefits, above-market severance pay, and stock option vesting, in accordance with laws and regulations in various countries. The cost of severance as well as consolidating leased office space is expected to be $1.2 billion this year. It was not immediately clear how many of the affected employees are in the US and how many work in other locations.

Even through this process, Microsoft says it will continue investing its money and people in key strategic areas for future growth, which are likely to involve AI. The memo ends with Nadella thanking all Microsoft employees for their dedication and resilience, but includes a warning that everyone must perform better for the company to thrive.

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CNN begins slashing workers as Chris Licht cuts costs: report

CNN began a long-expected round of layoffs on Wednesday as president Chris Licht and other executives at WarnerBros. Discovery trim costs at the struggling cable news network.

Licht informed CNN employees of the cuts in a memo and acknowledged “it will be a difficult time for everyone” at the company.

“It is incredibly hard to say goodbye to any one member of the CNN team, much less many. I recently described this process as a gut punch, because I know that is how it feels for all of us,” Licht said in the memo, which was obtained by The Hollywood Reporter.

Licht said the pink slips would begin with “a limited number of individuals, largely some of our paid contributors” on Wednesday as part of a “recalibrated reporting strategy.” The company will begin notifying other impacted employees on Thursday, with additional detail from Licht on CNN’s next steps to follow by that afternoon.

CNN’s Chris Licht has warned for weeks that layoffs were coming.
Getty Images for Warner Bros. Di

It wasn’t immediately clear how many CNN employees are being laid off. The Post has reached out to CNN for further comment.

This is a breaking story. Check back for updates.

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