Spotify, the Swedish audio-streaming company has announced it will layoff about 6% of its workforce of about 10,000 workers in the latest round of tech-sector layoffs designed to cut costs as the sector prepares to enter a global economic slowdown.
Announced earlier this week and designed to improve the company’s efficiency, the layoffs will affect roughly 6,000 employees, according to a company statement.
During the pandemic, as locked-down customers transitioned to online purchases, many tech companies added to their headcounts as business in the online sector surged. However following the reopening, as customers returned to the real world, and as rising interest rates and an increasingly aggressive Federal Reserve darkened the economic outlook, these companies have had to pare back their headcounts to contain costs.
Spotify co-founder and CEO Daniel Ek said in the statement which was sent to company employees, “Like many other leaders, I hoped to sustain the strong tailwinds from the pandemic and believed that our broad global business and lower risk to the impact of a slowdown in ads would insulate us.”
Spotify also noted that Dawn Osstroff, the company’s chief content and advertising business officer, would be exiting the company as part of a broader restructuring plan. The chief freemiun business officer, Alex Norstrom, and Gustav Soderstrom, the chief research and development officer will handle additional responsibilities as needed as co-presidents of the firm.
Spotify joins the growing list of companies which have pared back their workforces as the global economic outlook darkens. Amazon, Meta, Alphabet, and Microsoft are only the largest among many firms which have announced layoffs numbering in the thousands, with the possibility of more to come.
Even industry stalwart IBM has announced it will be firing roughly 1.4% of its employees across the globe, with the cuts primarily focusing on its IT services and healthcare groups. Crypto-exchange Gemini just announced a reduction in headcount of 10%, adding its name to the list of tech sector companies scaling back operations.
