Checkr, a 10-year-old startup that offers employee background checks and was last valued at $5 billion in April 2022, has laid off 382 employees as companies fail to hire top talent.
TechCrunch has exclusively learned that Checkr made the layoffs across all departments and at different levels on Tuesday. The San Francisco-based startup confirmed the layoffs in an email.
“In response to the economic conditions that have affected corporate hiring, we have made the difficult and painful decision to reduce the size of our team. This will allow us to operate more efficiently and ensure the long-term health of our business,” a Checkr spokesperson said in the statement.
The job cuts — which affected 32% of the company’s workforce — come nearly two years after Checkr announced the acquisition of Inflection, the startup behind GoodHire, a background check platform for small and medium businesses. At the time, the Wall Street Journal reported the deal was worth $400 million.
Backed by well-known investors including Durable Capital Partners, Fidelity Management & Research, Franklin Templeton, BOND and Coatue Management, Checkr enables companies to run background checks by reviewing potential employees’ driving and criminal records and basic identity verification their. The startup offers an online form to let companies run these checks or use its API, which can be integrated into recruiting systems or onboarding software, including Workable and Zenefits.
Founded in 2014, Checkr counts Uber, Instacart, Netflix, Adecco, Airbnb and Coinbase among its key customers. Its customer base has grown to more than tens of thousands of companies, from small and medium enterprises to Fortune 500 employers in 2022. Initially, the startup was limited to Silicon Valley, but expanded its presence beyond the Valley in 2016.
Checkr has given affected workers at least 10 weeks of severance and health insurance, as well as career and mental health support, the spokesman said.
The startup did not respond to questions about the runway and its fundraising plans. To date, it has raised $679 million, with the final round of $250 million to be announced in September 2021.
