Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

On Thursday, local time, as Amazon publicly announced a hiring freeze and several other technology companies, such as Lyft and Stripe, announced layoffs, the US technology industry seemed to be in a new "cold winter" of employment.

Amazon said its executives decided this week to suspend hiring because the economy was "in an unstable state". Last month, the e-commerce giant stopped hiring corporate and technical staff in its retail business.

"We expect to maintain this freeze in the coming months and will continue to keep an eye on the new situation we see in the economy and business," Beth Galetti, Amazon's executive in charge of human resources, wrote on the company's internal and corporate blog.

Meanwhile, Lyft, a ride-hailing company, said it would lay off 13 per cent of its 5000 employees. Payment processing platform Stripe has announced that it will cut 14% of its workforce, affecting about 1100 people.

For months, tech giants, including Meta and Amazon, have slowed hiring, while smaller tech companies such as Robinhood and Coinbase have announced layoffs. However, rarely have so many layoffs and hiring freezes been disclosed on the same day.

Technology companies have led the U. S. economy over the past decade, helping to boost the stock market during the worst days of the COVID-19 epidemic. But in recent weeks, many large companies have reported financial results that show they are feeling the effects of global economic tensions, soaring inflation and rising interest rates.

Social media companies, in particular, have been grappling with reduced support for digital advertising over the past few months. Facebook and Meta, the parent company of Instagram, said last week that their headcount would be "roughly the same" by the end of next year. The company plans to reduce the size of some of its teams and recruit only in high-priority areas.

Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, laid off 20 per cent of its staff in August because of the growing challenges posed by the macroeconomic environment.

Last week, Microsoft told investors that the number of new employees this quarter "should be very small." Meanwhile, Google and Alphabet, the parent company of YouTube, said they would hire less than half as many new employees this quarter as they did in the third quarter.

Amazon warned investors that revenue growth in the quarter could slow to its slowest level in 20 years, even with the upcoming critical holiday shopping season. After doubling the number of employees in 2020 and 2021, Amazon has been shrinking since the beginning of the year. By the end of the third quarter, the company had employed 1.5 million people.

Technology companies are making more layoffs. After buying Twitter for $44 billion last week, Elon Musk has ordered layoffs at the company, which employs about 7500 people. Twitter employees have begun to distribute "downsizing guidelines" with tips on how to deal with layoffs.

On Thursday, local time, Lyft said it had decided to cut jobs to cope with "a possible recession next year." Logan Green and John Zimmer, the company's founders, said in an email to employees that all teams would be affected.

"it is important to take these proactive actions to ensure that we can accelerate implementation, focus on the best opportunities for profitable growth and generate strong business performance," Green and Zimmer wrote. "

This summer, Lyft cut its workforce by 2 per cent, mainly because of the closure of its car rental business and a hiring freeze. But the company's founder said Lyft still needed to "get leaner". It is "not immune to the reality of inflation and economic slowdown", which has led to an increase in the cost of car-sharing insurance.

Lyft also said it plans to sell its first-party vehicle services business and expects the team's employees to keep their jobs.

Patrick Collison, co-founder and chief executive of Stripe, said that during the outbreak, the company hired too many people and spent too much money on operations, only to face inflation, high interest rates, rising energy costs and reduced start-up capital this year.

"We are overly optimistic about the short-term growth of the Internet economy and underestimate the possibility and impact of a broader slowdown," Collison said in an email to employees. "

Mr Collison added that layoffs would not be balanced across teams. For example, teams such as recruitment will have more layoffs because the company will reduce its hiring activity next year. In July, Stripe cut its internal valuation by 28% to $74 billion.

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