Snap, the parent company of messaging app Snapchat, said on Monday it would lay off more than 500 employees, joining other tech companies in a wave of new cost-cutting measures.
The layoffs represent 10 percent of its global workforce; the majority will occur in the first quarter of 2024.
“We have made the difficult decision to restructure our team,” the company said in a regulatory filing, adding that it would take pre-tax charges of between $55 million and $75 million, primarily for severance and related costs.
Amazon, Google and Microsoft have announced layoffs this year, following tens of thousands across the sector last year.
Snap laid off a small number of employees on Friday. Business Insider reported.
The company will present its results on Tuesday. Cost-cutting measures at other companies have boosted share prices. Snap shares were trading about 2 percent lower before the market opened on Monday.
Like other social media companies that rely on advertising, Snap has had a rough couple of years. Changes made by Apple to its privacy policy in 2021 made it more difficult for advertisers to track users, something that hurt Snap and also had a big effect on Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.
Snapchat, which has more than 400 million daily active users, saw revenue decline in the first two quarters of last year and only 5 percent growth in its most recent quarter, which ended Sept. 30.
In 2022, Snap cut 20 percent of its workforce, or 1,300 jobs, and also discontinued at least six products. In November it laid off nearly 20 product managers and in September it closed a division that sells augmented reality products to businesses, laying off 170 people.
