Following Meta, Google, Amazon, Intel, Micron, Qualcomm, HP, IBM and many other technology giants have announced layoffs, Dell, Sharp, Micron have also joined the layoff team.
01 Dell announced layoffs of 6,650 jobs
On February 6, PC manufacturer Dell officially announced that it will cut about 6,650 jobs, accounting for about 5% of the total number of employees worldwide. After this round of layoffs, Dell’s workforce will reach its lowest level since 2017.
According to Bloomberg, Dell COO Jeff Clarke said in a memo sent to employees that Dell expects market conditions to “continue to deteriorate with an uncertain future.” Clark said previous cost-cutting actions — suspending hiring and restricting travel were no longer enough to “stop the bleeding.”
Clark wrote: ‘We must make more decisions now to prepare for the path ahead. “We’ve been through recessions before and we’re stronger now.” When the market bounces back, we are prepared.’
It is understood that Dell’s layoffs came after a sharp decline in PC market demand. Dell’s fiscal third quarter results (ended October 28, 2022) released at the end of October last year showed that Dell’s total revenue for the quarter was $24.7 billion, down 6% year-over-year, and the company’s performance guidance was also lower than analyst expectations. Dell is expected to further explain the financial impact of layoffs when it releases its fiscal 2023 Q4 earnings report in March.
Dell is expected to further explain the financial impact of layoffs when it releases its fiscal 2023 Q4 earnings report in March. HP saw the largest drop in PC shipments in the top five of 2022, reaching 25.3%, and Dell also fell by 16.1%. In terms of PC market shipment data in the fourth quarter of 2022, Dell is the largest decline among the top five PC manufacturers, with a decline of 37.2%.
According to data from market research institute Gartner, global PC shipments fell by 16% year-on-year in 2022, and it is also expected that global PC shipments will continue to decline by 6.8% in 2023.
02 Sharp plans to implement layoffs and job transfers
According to Kyodo News, Sharp plans to implement layoffs and job transfer plans to improve performance, and has not disclosed the scale of layoffs.
Recently, Sharp lowered its performance forecast for the new fiscal year. Operating profit, which reflects the profit of the main business, was revised down to a loss of 20 billion yen (84.7 billion yen in the previous fiscal year) from a profit of 25 billion yen (approximately 1.3 billion yuan), and sales were revised down to 2.55 trillion yen from 2.7 trillion yen. The operating loss was the first in seven years after fiscal 2015, when the business crisis occurred.
To improve performance, Sharp announced plans to implement layoffs and job transfers. It has been reported that Sharp’s Malaysian plant that produces televisions and its European computer business will reduce the size of personnel. Sakai Display Products Co., Ltd. (SDP, Sakai City), a panel manufacturing subsidiary whose profit and loss situation has deteriorated, will reduce the number of dispatched employees. Regarding full-time employees in Japan, Sharp plans to transfer personnel from loss-making businesses to the pre-performance department.
03 After a 10% layoff, Micron Technology laid off another job in Singapore
Meanwhile, Micron Technology, a U.S. chipmaker that announced a 10 percent cut in its workforce globally in December, began laying off jobs in Singapore.
According to Lianhe Zaobao, Micron Technology’s Singapore employees posted on social media on the 7th that the company’s layoffs have begun. The employee said that the employees who were laid off were mainly junior colleagues, and the entire layoff operation is expected to last until February 18. Micron employs more than 9,000 people in Singapore, but did not disclose how many employees it would reduce in Singapore and other related details.
In late December, Micron said its worst industry glut in more than a decade would make it difficult to return to profitability in 2023 and announced a series of cost-cutting measures, including a 10 percent layoff in jobs, designed to help it cope with a rapid decline in revenue. Micron also expects sales to fall sharply this quarter, with losses exceeding analysts’ expectations.
In addition, in addition to planned layoffs, the company has suspended share buybacks, cut executive salaries, and will not pay company-wide bonuses to cut capital expenditures in fiscal 2023 and 2024 and operating costs in fiscal 2023. Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra has said the industry is experiencing the worst supply-demand imbalance in 13 years. Inventories should peak in the current period and then fall, he said. Mehrotra said that by around mid-2023, customers will shift to healthier inventory levels, and chipmakers’ revenues will improve in the second half of the year.
The layoffs of technology giants such as Dell, Sharp and Micron are not surprising, the global consumer electronics market demand has fallen sharply, and shipments of various electronic products such as mobile phones and PCs have fallen sharply year-on-year, which is even worse for the mature PC market that has entered the stock stage. In any case, under the severe winter of global technology, every consumer electronics company must be prepared for the winter.
Post time: Feb-10-2023