Layoffs mount: Twitter, tech, biotech firms chop 900-plus Bay Area jobs

Twitter and other companies have unveiled plans to chop more than 900 Bay Area jobs in a fresh round of tech and biotech layoffs that could jolt the region’s increasingly wobbly economy.

In recent days, plans for 913 tech and biotech job cuts—including hundreds more at Twitter—have been revealed in official filings with the state Employment Development Department that this news organization has reviewed.

The layoffs affect jobs in San Jose, San Francisco, Milpitas, Mountain View, Pleasanton, Redwood City and South San Francisco, a review of the filings with the EDD show.

Tech companies Twitter, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Western Digital, GoFundMe, Coursera, Asana, Intercom, Aerotek at Flex and biotech firm Synthego are among the companies that have filed with the EDD plans for job cuts.

By far, the job cuts at Facebook app owner Meta Platforms are responsible for the largest impact on the Bay Area job market.

The tech titan this month revealed plans to eliminate 2,564 jobs in the Bay Area, the EDD WARN filings show.

The next largest impact in the region’s job market results from Twitter’s prior and current job cuts, which are slated to eliminate more than 1,100 jobs in the Bay Area, according to the state labor notices.

In the most recent round of layoffs, these are among the most notable job cuts in the Bay Area that affect tech or biotech companies, and where the employment reductions are being planned. Among the companies involved in the current crop of layoffs:

• Twitter is cutting 236 jobs, consisting of 214 in San Francisco and 22 in San Jose.
• Western Digital, a maker of data storage and hard-disk drive devices, has decided to chop 189 positions, of which 103 are in San Jose and 86 are in Milpitas.
• Synthego, a biotech firm, is cutting 105 jobs in Redwood City.
• Asana, a software firm, has decided to jettison 97 positions in San Francisco.
• Thermo Fisher Scientific, a software and scientific instruments firm, is eliminating 95 jobs, including 49 in South San Francisco and 46 in Pleasanton.
• Coursera, which provides online courses, is cutting 77 jobs in Mountain View.
• Intercom, a software firm, has decided to chop 55 jobs in San Francisco.
• Aerotek at Flex, which provides contract tech services, is cutting 48 jobs in Milpitas.
• GoFundMe, a crowdfunding tech platform to raise money, will chop 11 jobs in San Francisco.

The latest cutbacks at Twitter mean that the social media platform has decided to eliminate 1,126 jobs in the Bay Area, the EDD filings show.

It’s possible that more cutbacks loom at other companies.

Earlier in November, San Jose-based Cisco Systems revealed that it has decided to chop 5% of its workforce, which could work out to the elimination of 4,100 jobs worldwide.

Just before Thanksgiving, Palo Alto-based Hewlett-Packard, a legendary tech behemoth, revealed plans to eliminate 4,000 to 6,000 jobs worldwide.

These layoffs would occur during HP’s 2023 fiscal year, which extends from Nov. 1, 2022 through sometime around Oct. 31, 2023. This means the layoffs could begin in short order or months from now. The impact on the HP Bay Area workforce wasn’t disclosed.

“HP Inc. announced a fiscal year 2023 Future Ready Transformation plan, driving significant structural cost savings through digital transformation, portfolio optimization and operational efficiency,” the company stated in a prepared release.

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