Google’s headquarters is seen on September 26, 2022 in Mountain View, California, United States. (Photo by Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
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Tech companies have laid off tens of thousands of workers in recent months as the industry struggles with reduced investor risk appetite and rising borrowing costs. Laid-off employees across the technology sector are entering an insecure job market where downsizing is happening across all experience levels and teams. Few companies, with the possible exception of Apple, have been immune.
Laid-off workers receive severance packages of varying sizes and durations, depending on where they work. Here’s what some of the biggest tech names have promised their employees.
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alphabet
That said CEO Sundar Pichai on Friday Google would lay off 12,000 employees in “product areas, functions, tiers and regions.” Fired US employees will be paid during the notice period and receive a 16-week base severance pay with an additional two weeks for each year of service at Google.
Laid-off employees would also be accelerated for “at least” 16 weeks of stock allocation, Pichai said in a memo to employees. Employees would also receive 6 months of health insurance.
A filing by Google’s parent company Alphabet with the Securities and Exchange Commission shared Pichai’s memo but did not specify the cost of the layoffs.
CNBC previously reported that employees had been anticipating layoffs with growing concern, and at a heated all-hands meeting in September 2022, where employees opposed Pichai’s cost-cutting efforts.
Microsoft
CEO Satya Nadella said in an employee memo that some would find out this week if they lost their jobs.
Eligible U.S. employees will receive severance pay, six months of healthcare and stock delivery, and 60 days’ notice, Nadella wrote. The Microsoft CEO had already alluded to possible cost-cutting efforts in an interview with CNBC-TV18.
“We also need to have our own kind of operational focus on making sure our spend is in line with our revenue growth,” Nadella said.
Microsoft will take a $1.2 billion impairment as a result of its restructuring and layoff efforts.
Amazon
Earlier this week, the company began its latest wave of layoffs, with the deepest cuts being felt in retail and human resources.
For US retail employees, Amazon is offering full pay and benefits for a 60-day period during which Amazon will continue to hold them on the payroll, but they are not expected to continue working. According to this, Amazon offers the dismissed employees a severance payment of several weeks, a separation allowance, health transition benefits and a job placement service, depending on the length of service.
Amazon’s severance package appears to be similar for affected employees in other units. HR director Beth Galetti said the company will offer a severance payment, health benefits by country and job placement.
It’s unclear if Amazon’s severance package includes provisions that would allow employees to expedite the transfer of stock awards. This is significant for Amazon employees because the company’s compensation has historically been heavily stock-biased. An Amazon spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Foreclosure
CEO Marc Benioff announced this to employees on January 4th In response to a difficult economic environment, Salesforce would reduce headcount by approximately 10%, or more than 7,000 employees. Laid-off employees would receive at least “almost” five months’ salary. Benioff’s letter to employees also said laid-off employees would receive health insurance benefits and career resources for an unclear duration.
Some employees who lost their jobs were notified the same day.
“Those outside of the US will receive a similar level of support,” Benioff wrote. The company expected a $1 billion to $1.4 billion impairment related to severance payments and “employee turnover,” among other things, according to an 8-K filing.
Benioff told employees more layoffs could be coming, just days after those cuts were announced in January.
Meta
This was announced by CEO Mark Zuckerberg on November 9th Over 11,000 jobs would be cut to become a “leaner and more efficient company”. Meta stocks had been hit hard for months, and investors had begun to be more active in criticizing Zuckerberg’s expensive switch to virtual reality.
Mark Zuckerberg, Chief Executive Officer of Meta Platforms Inc., center, exits federal courthouse in San Jose, California, on Tuesday, December 20, 2022.
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At the time, Zuckerberg promised “every” laid-off employee 16 weeks of severance pay plus two weeks for each year of service, as well as RSU vesting and health insurance coverage for a predetermined period.
In December 2022, some laid-off workers from a non-traditional apprenticeship program told CNBC they were receiving inferior severance pay compared to other recently laid-off workers. Instead of the 16 weeks promised by Zuckerberg, they received only 8 weeks of base salary, among other material differences.
Under the terms of Musk’s buyout deal, existing termination agreements were to be honored by new management. But a group of Twitter employees filed a lawsuit in November, shortly after the layoffs were carried out, accusing Twitter of firing them in violation of California’s Layoff Notice Act.
had musk previously said that fired employees would receive three months’ severance pay, but some Twitter employees claimed that Twitter would offer them only one month’s severance pay in exchange for a non-nuisance agreement and a statutory waiver.
The class action lawsuit was updated shortly after it was filed with allegations that Twitter was offering some fired employees half of what they had been promised.
Twitter also fired over 4,000 contract workers without notice, CNBC previously reported.
CNBC’s Annie Palmer, Jonathan Vanian, Jennifer Elias, Jordan Novet, Lora Kolodny, Ashley Capoot, and Sofia Pitt contributed to this report.