Hundreds more people are being laid off by Bay Area IT companies.
More than 250 workers in San Francisco are among the hundreds of people being let go by Bay Area tech companies.
Notifications that Salesforce, Flexport, eBay, and Okta submitted with the state Employment Development Department lately indicate that each of these companies is letting go of employees in The City. Furthermore, San Francisco-based DocuSign disclosed on Tuesday that it intends to lay off 400 workers, or around 6% of its whole workforce.
In addition to saying that it anticipates reporting fourth-quarter profits that are in line with or higher than its projections, DocuSign is also laying off employees. CEO Allan Thygesen of the electronic-signature service provider stated in an open letter to staff that the company has a “strong opportunity” ahead of it and is moving forward with plans to provide new products that will increase revenue.
However, he noted that it will take several years for that work to pay off, so in the meanwhile the business needs to monitor its finances and make expense reductions.
Thygesen stated in the post that laying off employees was “a painful decision, and it is not one I, the leadership team, or the board make lightly.”
Declaring that these layoffs mark the second set of layoffs DocuSign has disclosed since his appointment as CEO in October 2022, he expressed his sincere regret that “we must undertake this task once more.”
DocuSign declared in February 2023 that it will be laying off 10% of its employees. Following its announcement of a 9% cut in September 2022, those layoffs occurred.
The EDD revealed on Tuesday that the following businesses have issued layoff warnings in San Francisco:
Salesforce: as of April 23, the company employs 55 people at its 415 Mission St. headquarters.
Okta: As of April 4, the company employs 83 people at its headquarters on the sixth level of 100 First St.
Flexport: as of February 2, the company employs 99 individuals at its 760 Market St., eighth-floor headquarters.
Effective January 24, eBay will have 20 employees based at 300 Mission St., 19th floor.
On Thursday, Okta made the announcement that it would be laying off 400 workers, or 7% of its global workforce. According to CEO Todd McKinnon’s letter to colleagues, which The Examiner obtained from an Okta official, the identity authentication company is reducing staff in order to reduce expenses.
“We need to run the company more efficiently if we want to grow profitably. The fact is that costs are excessively high, even with the positive moves we’ve made, according to McKinnon. “This is a proactive step to help position the business for long-term success,”
Conversely, EBay declared in Januarysaid it intended to reduce the number of contractors it used and lay off roughly 1,000 individuals, or 9% of its full-time workforce worldwide. Apart from workforce reductions in The City, the online auction company is also laying off 261 staff members at its San Jose headquarters.
In an open letter to staff members published last month, CEO Jamie Iannone stated that the company is making these adjustments in order to position itself for “long-term, sustainable growth.”
Iannone remarked, “These changes are challenging, but I’m sure that by cooperating we will become stronger than ever.”
A request for comment from Salesforce representatives was not immediately answered.
The City and the Bay Area have already seen thousands of job losses from tech companies last year; these layoffs are merely the most recent.