Meta plans to fire 'thousands' of its employees - Reports

WASHINGTON - US tech conglomerate Meta Platforms Inc (formerly Facebook Inc) plans to initiate major job cuts this week, Sputnik quoted US media reports.

The upcoming "large-scale layoffs" could become the largest round of tech job cuts and could affect "thousands" of people, The Wall Street Journal said on Sunday, citing people familiar with the matter, but without specifying exactly how many of over 87,000 Meta employees could get fired.

Sources told the newspaper that the announcement of the job cuts was expected on Wednesday and company officials have already told Meta employees to cancel nonessential travel starting this week.

The New York Times reported on Sunday that the layoffs are expected to start at the end of this week.

According to the newspaper, Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s chief executive, had said that the company could become "smaller" by the end of 2023.

US billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, who recently acquired Twitter, said earlier this week that the company currently has no other choice than to fire employees since it is losing money.

Five current and former employees filed a class-action lawsuit against the social media company on Thursday for allegedly failing to provide sufficient notice of the mass layoffs following Musk’s takeover. - BERNAMA