Spotify Lays Off 6% Of Its Employees

In order to increase efficiency, Spotify, a Swedish music streaming service, has stated it will fire 6% of its around 10,000 employees. Daniel Ek, the business's CEO, wrote on the blog of the company, "In retrospect, I was excessively ambitious in investing ahead of our sales growth. Despite its prominence in the online music market, Spotify has never recorded a full year of net profit. It comes after Microsoft and Alphabet's losses were disclosed last week.

Google's parent company, Alphabet, announced that it will cut 12,000 jobs, and Microsoft said that up to 10,000 people might lose their employment. I fully accept responsibility for the actions that led to where we are now, Mr. Ek said. The business also announced that Dawn Ostroff, the chief content and advertising business officer, will leave as part of a larger restructure. Spotify, which had roughly 9,800 full-time employees a year ago, stated that it anticipated severance-related costs to be at least €35 million (£30 million).

Since its founding, the Swedish firm, which is traded on the New York Stock Exchange, has made significant investments to drive growth through forays into new markets and, in later years, with the creation of exclusive content like podcasts. The business had previously announced in October that it would reduce hiring through the end of the year and into 2023. The news of Spotify comes at a time when the IT industry is experiencing a dip following two years of pandemic-driven development during which they aggressively hired. 

According to Techcrunch, impacted Spotify workers will be given the opportunity to have one-on-one interactions. They will receive severance money, the amount of which varies based on the location and the required local notice time. Employees will typically receive five months of severance pay. Healthcare coverage will be maintained throughout the severance period, and accrued and unused vacation time will be paid out. The company predicted in a filing that severance-related costs would total between €35 and €45 million. Spotify will also provide assistance with immigration and career.

In recent weeks, hundreds of people have disclosed layoffs, including some of the largest names in the industry. Amazon said at the beginning of this year that it will be laying off more than 18,000 employees due to "the uncertain economy" and a spike in hiring during the pandemic. Meta said in November that it would lay off 11,000 workers, or 13% of its workforce.