After layoff activity in the tech industry quieted down around the holidays, it’s come back with a vengeance in January. According to our Layoff Tracker, 80,076 job eliminations have been announced or completed since the beginning of the year. The total number of tech layoffs since we began tracking in late August is now 195,856.
This past week alone, substantial layoffs were announced by Ericsson (5,000), Intel (6,000), and Microsoft (5,000). The biggest job loss by far is the 34,000 employees of Circuit City, which announced it is going out of business last week.
Among startups, layoffs hit Digg, Federated Media, and O”Reilly Media. Even Google was not immune, with 100 internal recruiters losing their jobs, many more contractors, and rumors swirling that more cuts may be on the way.
If you know of any layoffs at a tech company, please submit a tip with the name of the company and number of layoffs. If it’s been covered, also send a link to the blog post or news article. (For who is hiring, check out our job board).
Below is the list of January layoffs from our tracker.
| Company | Date | Location | # | % | Source |
| Digg | January 22, 2009 | San Francisco, CA | 7 | 10% | Cnet |
| Microsoft | January 22, 2009 | Redmond, WA | 5,000 | 5% | TechCrunch |
| Ericsson | January 21, 2009 | Stockholm, Sweden | 5,000 | 6% | Cnet |
| Bose | January 21, 2009 | Framingham, MA | 1,000 | 10% | Boston Globe |
| Intel | January 21, 2009 | 6,000 | Network World | ||
| Clear Channel Radio | January 20, 2009 | 1,850 | 9% | paidContent | |
| Warner Brothers | January 20, 2009 | Hollywood | 800 | Yahoo Finance | |
| SEGA | January 20, 2009 | San Francisco, CA | 30 | IGN | |
| Circuit City | January 17, 2009 | USA | 34,000 | 100% | Circuit City website |
| Federated Media | January 16, 2009 | 7 | Company Blog | ||
| AMD | January 16, 2009 | 1,100 | 9% | Washington Post | |
| Autodesk | January 15, 2009 | Worldwide | 750 | 10% | Reuters |
| Oversee.net | January 15, 2009 | Los Angeles | 40 | 18% | DomainName Wire |
| O’Reilly Media | January 15, 2009 | Sebastopol | 30 | 14% | Press Democrat |
| NEC | January 15, 2009 | Australia | 200 | Daily Telegraph | |
| January 14, 2009 | 100 | 1% | Official Google Blog | ||
| Varolii | January 14, 2009 | Seattle | 8% | TechFlash | |
| Oracle | January 14, 2009 | United State | 500 | 1% | MSN Money |
| Plantronics | January 14, 2009 | Santa Cruz | 900 | 18% | San Jose Mercury News |
| Motorola | January 14, 2009 | 4,000 | Wall Street Journal | ||
| WatchGuard | January 13, 2009 | Seattle | 55 | 9% | TechFlash |
| TBD Networks | January 13, 2009 | San Jose | 5 | 50% | TechCrunch |
| Financial Times | January 12, 2009 | London, UK | 80 | Guardian | |
| Seagate | January 12, 2009 | US | 800 | 10% | AP |
Obviously it isn’t a good thing for the people involved with the firings, but for the small companies, this is actually a good sign. This shows that these companies are starting to realize that they have to be somewhat self sustaining, that they can’t keep up their current burn rate. They are starting to realize that they have to be able to take matters into their own hands and not just keep going back to VC for money over and over again.
With companies like Digg laying off 10% of their workforce and making a goal to be profitable this year (whether or not they will do it) it really shows that some of these “web 2.0″ companies are finally growing up.
schoolshift.com
dankalmar.com
twitter.com/dankalmar
Consider one thing: companies like Ericsson etc. take back or rehire most of them in other positions. This may not be as bad as layoffs in manufacturing.
I agree, as large companies are starting to cut costs, this makes room for small efficient companies to grow. This might actually be good for the economy in the long run.
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With companies like Digg laying off 10% of their workforce and making a goal to be profitable this year (whether or not they will do it) it really shows that some of these “web 2.0″ companies are finally growing up.
http://kisalt.net/d2
Stop Spamming
Seriously.
Since nobody else is asking, I will. What on earth makes anyone consider Circuit City a “tech layoff”? I can’t picture anyone there anything other than retail.
We define tech broadly. Consumer electronics are certainly part of tech, and layoffs at Circuit City reflect weakness for tech products overall.
You could argue they don’t belong. We choose to include them. Even without Circuit City, there were nearly 50K layoffs in January, and more than 150K total.
To me at least, adding companies like Circuit City makes the counter less meaningful.
What I, and, I bet, most people, are most interested in are those companies that are developing technology and/or traditionally considered in the technology sector. That gives the best indication of how the market is looking for Tech Professionals, which actually serves a useful purpose for me. Unlike the version that includes CC.
I wouldn’t call 34,000 jobs at Circuit City tech jobs, that is really skewing the number.
Agreed, Circuit City is inflating the number. Clear channel and Circuit City are not tech companies.
Plus, what is the definition of a tech layoff anyway? I’m sure almost half the layoffs are not really technical staff.
Its really bad out there, but these numbers are bogus. I got a good laugh out of using “Techcrunch” as a source.
add the numbers up in these posts. erick’s been inflating them for a while. to what end, i do not know
anything that use a light bulb is a tech company! how difficult it is to understand?
TechCrunch should use standard industry categories/sectors like everyone else, instead of creating meaningless statistics. They could cast a wide net and follow the Technology industry, but even that would exclude Circuit City, which is in the Retail/Services industry.
i agree, circuit city isn’t a tech company.
Does any one know the total number of people affected by layoffs in 2001 (in Bay Area)
Layoffs in general stink, but I think many companies grew beyond their ability to sustain them too quickly, and much of this is just self-correction, sadly.
The numbers for Microsoft are skewing these figures. Their layoffs will be spread over the next two years. They did NOT layoff 5,000 all at once.
We count both announced and completed layoffs in the tracker. Companies announce these things once, that’s when they go in and are accounted for.
So in other words, you’re going for sensational headlines. Who needs real analysis-a hit is a hit.
That’s it exactly Steve. Take bad news and embellish it to make it sound worse. That’s the media’s stock and trade.
I am surprised that HP does not show up in the list. I know there have been layoffs in the hundreds just at the site I worked at. The HP way has definitely been decimated by Mark Hurd.
they are on the full list. this is just January layoffs.
Are the layoffs really ONLY a result of a bad economy? Doesn’t better competition have a little something to do with these numbers? For many of the organizations you present layoff numbers for, many of their direct competitors are growing. Isn’t there some Darwinism here? You present the layoffs but are those numbers off set by the number of hires?
Digg has a 10% layoff while Mixx grows their team by almost 50%. Circuit City closes all of its stores while Best Buy opens many new stores. Microsoft is down by 5% while Apple has a $10 Billion Dollar year! Google goes down by 1% while search competitors grow significantly in the last year. The Financial Times struggles in print while Fool.com grows significantly with a brand new head quarters.
Agree on the Circuity City comment, a stretch to call those Tech layoffs, it’s retail. It’s bad enough out there wihtout hyping the numbers
.
well if you go back through some previous posts. he makes up numbers that aren’t necessarily close to the sum of the layoff tracker
this might be the case here
FWIW, I agree with those that suggest it would be wise to discount Circuit City. (Retail)
The FT’s layoffs come as a bit of a surprise, I have haven’t heard of any other newspaper related layoffs as yet.
“Heard” F5 laid 90 people a couple of days ago.
submit a tip link is broken
thnx, fixed
Your approach is completely inappropriate here. You can’t with a straight face count Circuit City as a tech company – and Circuit City alone accounted for almost half of your total. I understand that your all about eyeballs and clicks but please exercise some restraint / journalistic integrity here. This type of of post symbolizes everything that’s wrong with tech blogs.
add the numbers up
You don’t need to. The Layoff Tracker adds up the numbers automatically. All numbers are per the Tracker. We do a post when a milestone is hit.
I can. They sell tech products. See above.
So does Walmart….
Time to send the H1-B visas home!!
Only if you could find a replacement with even remotely similar skills….
Circuit City is retail, not tech.
I guess you do whatever it takes to just get a headline regardless of underlying truth?
I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t consider Circuit City a tech company…
Layoffs as per my opinion are something a CEO and top management in a company should feel really ashamed of. It clearly means they failed in there jobs to protect there own employees due to stupid bad decisions. Most of the layoffs are because the Management screwed big time in its business strategy in the past and resorted to layoffs to save there skin and to boost the stock prices up.
This is the type of Management which is failing this great nation of ours. A true measure of any good CEO or Management is no layoffs during their term. Management should only hire if there is a need for atleast in the coming 5 years or so.
I would appreciate if Techcrunch or anybody else can try to find out those CEO’s or companies who never laid off its employees say a period of last 5 years.
Best of luck and wishes to all those who got laid off.
Thanks
Srinivasa Kaundinya
CEO, Amegasoft LLC.
Well then I guess Eric Schmidt, Steve Ballmer, among others are bad CEO’s…lol
Anyway, here is a video of Google CEO Eric Schmidt being interviewed by Jim Cramer about the job market, great interview as always:
http://equedia....and-Our-Economy
Your approach would lead to consistently higher unemployment rates.
As the past week saw 80k+ job losses and more techies went searching for jobs, the iPhone app iJobs captures this reality succinctly as it rose to the top in its category. What next app would rise to the top ?
iJobs rise to the Top has more details with chart on the effect of these job cuts.
whoa! Guess that’s some problems going on. Hope those who have lost their jobs land on their feet. Stupid Economic thingy (I know what it is. I just think that this makes my point.), ahhh! And Microsoft’s no better, Vista was their problem anyway.
I’ve been out of work for almost a year now. I use to work for Merrill lynch as a trader now I can’t even get a call back from e trade. I feel bad for the programmer community, I guess were in the same boat now.
I think that we’ll emerge from this a much more creative economy. If we emerge.
thanksrecession.com
I couldn’t find any bargains at circuit city…good ridden!
This is not good news for the tech industry and since there are no IPOs, it will likely get worse since startups won’t get funded if investors can’t cash out!
Add IBM to the list, few of my colleagues got laid off. I think they laid off a total of 16,000 employees
This is not good news for the tech industry. However the number here does not really indicate lay offs in US, but globally. Is there a way we can just track the US number or even the bay area for that matter?
I feel for these tech workers.
There is still a huge demand for SharePoint admins and develpers. I get 2 or 3 calls a week from recruiters looking to place me in a new position. I am happy where I am but I am just saying it is a hot area.
The work is pretty easy too.
=0 thats crazy! i know like that 3 people that got laid off from cc
-Jim
http://www.movi...nlineforum.com/
(just getting started so check it out)
If the removed teir entire IT force and killed their econmerce site then maybe. But as a retailer of broadly relevant technology items like car stereos and washing machines I find the inclusion meaningless.
They were troubled prior to this year. They’ve been poorly managed forever. This is a bankruptcy whose time was coming for awhile now. Would you inlcude general motors too bc their cars rely on integrated circuits am processors and electric timers?
Would a nuclear power plant closing count?
Boeing? That company is far more relevant than a big box retailer.
Maersk? A large Danish container shipping company that has a 10000 person IT group?
Eric if cc wouldn’t trade on the NASDAQ then I think you have your answer.
credibility of the entire ‘tech layoff tracker’ is gone with the inclusion and defense of Circuit City as a tech company.
The noble thing to do is just admit you are wrong.
Erick, insisting CCity is a tech company calls into question your intelligence… c’mon… admit you are wrong and take it out. everyone will respect you more
Dang, that list is getting scarily long. Hoping for a mid-09 reversal of the economy’s fortunes.