Techrights

Google Has Mass Layoffs (Again), But the Problem is Vastly Larger

Posted by Roy Schestowitz on Dec 21, 2024,

updated Dec 21, 2024

Company debt in billions (Microsoft's debt is third biggest after the "A" in "GAFAM", Amazon and Apple); Google - with dominance in Web, browsers, operating systems (Android) and search/ads - isn't even the worst off:

Tech debt charted

WHAT started as a rumour about January 2025 ended up with more official communications from Google. The rumour was true. Google will lay off loads of people, just as Microsoft did every month so far this year (on a large scale, not sporadically). We've added links about this to Daily Links and we're seeing dozens more (in English) right now. Not much is unique about those. Articles like his one (with slight variation) say Sundar Pichai announces 10% job cuts in managerial roles. Amazon said something similar months ago. Facebook had done the same. At Microsoft, executives or managers had their salary cut.

GAFAM as a whole - not just Microsoft - is having problems. Amazon is forcing more and more people to "return to office", even people who never worked from the office (since joining Amazon). Amazon staff tells us that. There's growing fear that many key people will resign - but then again, that's the intention of R.T.O.

GAFAM is very deep in debt, so cuts are imperative. Companies don't lay off many people, except as a last resort because it damages confidence, morale etc.

In the case of Microsoft, it's still attempting vertical integration for vendor lock-in (sometimes in the name of "security", which is a lie in this case too). Even Microsoft's CEO admits Windows is no longer a viable cash cow:

An associate has explained that they're "abusing an existing monopoly to illegally extend it into a new market" ("Microsoft won't let customers opt out of passkey push") and Andy explained back in September that it's not about security. Hopefully we can publish Andy's latest article later today. █