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Zoom axes 15% of workforce

February 8, 2023

Zoom, the video conferencing tool that became a household name amidst pandemic-enforced lockdowns, has announced it is cutting 15 per cent of its workforce due to slow user growth slow and declining profits.

Eric Yuan, Zoom CEO, said he and other bosses would also take significant pay cuts as the company focuses on its long-term vision.

“As the world transitions to life post-pandemic, we are seeing that people and businesses continue to rely on Zoom,” Yuan wrote in a message to employees. “But the uncertainty of the global economy, and its effect on our customers, means we need to take a hard –  yet important – look inward to reset ourselves so we can weather the economic environment, deliver for our customers and achieve Zoom’s long-term vision.”

Yuan said he would also reduce his salary in the coming fiscal year by 98 per cent and forego his bonus. Other members of the executive leadership team will see their base salaries fall by 20 per cent and also lose bonuses,

“We worked tirelessly […] but we also made mistakes. We didn’t take as much time as we should have to thoroughly analyse our teams or assess if we were growing sustainably, toward the highest priorities,” Yuan continued. “As the CEO and founder of Zoom, I am accountable for these mistakes and the actions we take today – and I want to show accountability not just in words but in my own actions.”

Zoom’s revenue more than tripled in 2020 and grew by some 55 per cent in 2021. But in 2022, the gains slowed to single digits and profits plummeted.

Amazon, Meta and Salesforce are among the other heavyweight tech companies to have announced job cuts in recent weeks.

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