Tech layoffs spill into 2024: Google and Alphabet have both axed hundreds of employees in January

The last two years have been brutal for tech companies with a lot of them forced to lay off a section of their workforce to stay afloat. A lot of these companies had over-hired during the pandemic when the introduction of remote work resulted in an increased uptake of tech products.

2024 was expected to be the year of recovery but it has not been the perfect start many people would have anticipated. 35 tech companies have already laid off 5,586 employees according to data from Layoffs.fyi.

Tough economic times are still to blame, but AI is also coming up as a real threat to jobs in the new year.

Google is leading the pack after it axed hundreds of people from the ad sales department in favour of AI automation. And according to Google CEO, Sundar Pichai, it’s just the start.

In a memo titled, “2024 priorities and the year ahead,” the CEO wrote that to continue innovating, the company would need to make some tough choices which includes reducing its workforce.

The CEO wrote noting that the reduction in workforce will help the company to “simplify execution and drive velocity.

However, Pichai assures that the layoffs this year will not be as bad as last year.

So far Alphabet, Google's parent company, has let go of about 1000 employees from several teams, including Pixel smartphones, hardware, ads, and services. It also let go of 100 employees from the YouTube team.

In contrast, the company slashed 6% of its workforce (12,000 people) in January last year.

Other big tech companies that have recently announced layoffs include Qualcomm, Broadcom, Meta, Microsoft, Cisco, Oracle, and Red Hat.