// By: Roberto Vizzuett
Tue March 14, 2023
Metathe matrix of Facebook, Instagram y Whatsappcontinues trying to correct the course after a bad prospect two years ago, made his CEO Mark Zuckerberg significantly increase the company’s workforce, which since last year has basically been seen as a drag.
In total, Meta is looking to lay off others 10,000 employees and cancel 5,000 vacancies not yet filled. This is in addition to the around 11,000 layoffs they announced in November of last year — which at that time meant a 13% cut in their staff, which was around 87,000 people.
in the same ad posted on facebookOn the one hand, Zuckerberg confesses to having “dismissed” the indirect costs of low-priority projects, and on the other, he seeks to justify and pat himself on the back for last year’s layoffs, mentioning that “since we reduced our workforce last year, a surprising result was that many things are now faster.
The first round of layoffs will take place this week, affecting the recruiting area under the logic that since there are fewer hires, the hiring team should be reduced. In April it will be the technology teams that are affected by layoffs, followed in May by those in the business areas.
Zuckerberg’s extensive and elaborate text only reinforces my statement that Meta and similar companies are on the post-pandemic slope or raw. In the case of Meta, in two and a half years its workforce increased by 42,344 people thanks to the “fever” of the metaverse and NFTs. Yesterday they announced that they will stop investing in pursuing their vaunted integration of NFTs — or “digital collectibles” — to Instagram and Facebook, which only started on Instagram in May of last year.
Some product news: across the company, we’re looking closely at what we prioritize to increase our focus. We’re winding down digital collectibles (NFTs) for now to focus on other ways to support creators, people, and businesses. 🧵[1/5]
— Stephane Kasriel (@skasriel) March 13, 2023
The company lost about 70% of its value last year, according to StatMuse, which Zuckerberg described as a humble wake-up call. And last February, during the financial report of Meta, the CEO called 2023 the “year of efficiency” for Meta. Philosophy that is definitely not applying to the vision of the metaverse, since keep losing billions of dollars in its Reality Labs division.
