Technical layoffs are speeding, according to the evidence. The increase in staff cuts comes after human capital reductions slowed so much in the second half of 2023 that we wrote that “technology layoffs are only a thing of the past.” At the time, reported layoffs had been falling for months and months to reach a nadir that was so low it felt insignificant.
How things have changed. At the time, we assumed that rising tech valuations were taking some pressure off technology concerns, and that large-scale cuts seemed to lose their luster compared to more targeted reductions in overall headcount. Then 2024 rolled around and changed the script.
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The recent wave of layoffs has hit tech shops big and small. Veho, a package delivery company, cut 65 jobs this week, or about a fifth of its total workforce. After rapid revenue growth in 2023, mid-sized tech companies are also shrinking. Brex’s latest layoffs make it clear that even some of the best-known and most well-funded, cutting-edge tech companies are finding their headcount to be excessive. And big companies are cutting back, too, with Microsoft cutting 1,900 jobs yesterday, and Google planning more cuts throughout the year. In the latter case, staggered layoffs are a great way to tell employees to quit, so expect full attrition at the search giant to overcome forced exits.
The plural of anecdotes is not data, so we need to look at historical trends to put these layoffs into context. Fortunately, this information is available to us and we can report that, yes, the wave of layoffs you are feeling is in fact a real wave. Let’s dig into how aggressively tech companies are putting people out of business and our job hypotheses about why the cuts are coming with such frequency and depth.
Looking at the data
Tech layoffs bottomed out in September 2023. That month, Layoffs.FYI counted just 4,707 tech layoffs across 65 total known cuts. Those numbers rose in the final months of the year, reaching just over 8,000 in November and 7,000 in December, resulting in 72 and 56 known cuts, respectively.
