Google has laid off over 100 employees in its cloud computing unit, continuing its efforts to lower its staff headcount.
The layoffs largely affected U.S.-based roles in design and user experience, according to Business Insider and CNBC.
Google Cloud’s revenue and operating income both saw major growth last quarter. “Its annual revenue run-rate is now more than $50 billion,” Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai said in the company’s second quarter earnings release.
“With this strong and growing demand for our Cloud products and services, we are increasing our investment in capital expenditures in 2025 to approximately $85 billion and are excited by the opportunity ahead,” Pichai said.
Google Cloud’s quantitative user experience research and platform & service experience teams were heavily impacted by the layoffs, per CNBC.
More than 200 contractors working on Google’s artificial intelligence products were also dismissed in multiple rounds of layoffs in August, Wired reported. These contractors were employed by digital engineering companies like GlobalLogic, and trained Google’s chatbots and other AI features.
Google reportedly told employees in August that it had cut managers overseeing teams of fewer than four employees by 35% over the past year. In June, it offered buyouts to employees in many of its divisions.
The company has sought to reduce its staff headcount since 2023. It laid off around 12,000 employees in January of that year.
Google and Alphabet CEO Anat Ashkenazi said in October 2024 that Google aimed to cut costs in 2025 to offset increases in capital expenditure, particularly in its cloud and AI products.
Alphabet's (NASDAQ: GOOG) share price closed at US$245.594, up from its previous close at $243.55. Its market capitalisation is $2.96 trillion.
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