BENGALURU: In its latest cost-cutting measure, SoftBank-backed Unacademy will fire around 380 or 12% of its workforce. This is the fourth round of layoffs, as the unicorn in November fired 350 employees or 10% of its employees.
In the internal memo to employees, Gaurav Munjal, Co-Founder and CEO, Unacademy Group said, “We have taken every step in the right direction to make our core business profitable, yet it’s not enough. We have to go further, we have to go deeper. Unfortunately, this has led me to take another difficult decision.”
“We will be reducing the size of our team by 12% to ensure that we can meet the goals we are chasing in the current realities we face. I did not anticipate I would have to do this again, and I’m very sorry,” he said in the note.
He added that today, the global economy is enduring a recession, funding is scarce and running a profitable business is key. “We have to adapt to these changes, build and operate in a much leaner manner so we can truly create value for our users and shareholders,” he added.
The start-up also said that impacted employees will be receiving severance pay equivalent to notice period and an additional one month’s pay. They will also get medical Insurance coverage for additional six months- till September 30.
In January, it fired 40 employees in its subsidiary Relevel. With funding winter, many start-ups are struggling and are looking to make business profitable. In 2022 alone, Tiger Global-backed edtech company Vedantu laid off 1,000 employees. Recently, Microsoft-owned GitHub fired its entire engineering team- about 142 people- in India.
At a time when big tech companies and start-ups are firing people, employees are also worried that technologies such as Artificial Intelligence might eliminate many jobs in the future. In a report, Goldman Sachs says that 300 million jobs could be affected by generative Artificial Intelligence. The report also said that the impact will vary between different sectors.
Layoff season
Unacademy to reduce 12% of its workforce
CEO says funding is scarce and running a profitable biz is key
Last year, Byju’s and Vedantu too laid off employees
In 2022 alone, Vedantu laid off 1,000 employees
Goldman Sachs said 300 mn jobs could be affected by latest wave of AI