California News:
According to new federal WARN notices and EDD filings, three major Bay Area companies lost 796 employees within the last few days, delivering yet another major economic blow to the region.
The San Francisco Bay Area and Silicon Valley, still reeling after tens of thousands of job cuts in 2022 and 2023 respectively, looked forward to a better 2024, with less job cuts, a better economy, and new growth industries such as AI helping revitalize the area. However, a little more than a few months into the new year, and 2024 is currently on pace to be just as bad as previous years in the Bay area. Multiple tech companies have already announced the firings of thousands of employees, with some companies getting rid of close to 2,000 employees in a single day. It also bled outside the tech sector, as Levi Strauss announced between 10-15% of their workforce, mostly in San Francisco, are to be fired this year. In February, firing continued, affecting tech firm Okta, who let go of 7% of their staff in San Francisco, Cisco with 4,000 job cuts, and the online form-filler company DocuSign, who laid off around 6% of their workforce, or 400 people in total.
The entire region also saw jobs in total decline, with San Francisco losing 21,000 positions in the last three months alone. Most recently, this has included Apple, who fired over 600 employees in early April in their first post-COVID layoff.
Earlier this week, Checkr, a San Francisco-based startup that runs background checks, filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) notice. In it, they said that 382 workers nationwide, including 260 employees in San Francisco, would be let go. The company didn’t go very much into details on why the layoffs happened, avoiding the usual reasons such as overhiring during the pandemic, problems within San Francisco, and high costs in favor of a generic “economic conditions” reason.
“The overall layoff includes 382 workers,” said the company earlier this week. “This will allow us to operate more efficiently and ensure the long term health of our business. The painful and difficult cuts are in response to economic conditions that have impacted companies’ hiring.”
Two companies with offices in South San Francisco, biotech firms Genentech and Sanofi, also announced layoffs on Friday. In EDD filings, Genentech announced that 436 employees would be laid off, with Sanofi announcing 100 are to be let go. For Sanofi, the cuts are because of the company wanting to divest itself from Amunix Pharmaceuticals. Meanwhile, Genentech said in a statement that they are “Refocusing their efforts on the most promising treatments it has in development, it. This limited reduction will allow us to shift resources to the areas that we believe can provide the greatest impact for patients.”
For hiring experts in San Francisco, the cuts, while not coming as a shock, continue to highlight the fast decline of jobs in the Bay Area.
“Every time San Francisco or another company says they are gaining jobs, there is a huge new study or announcement showing that they are not,” said Julie Ochs, a San Jose-based headhunter and hiring specialist told the Globe on Friday. “San Francisco had the overall lost jobs report recently. No matter how many jobs are gained with AI or other areas, they’re just losing more. And this is damning too. Biotech was supposed to be San Francisco’s big saving effort about 5 years ago, like what AI is today. And look where a lot of these recent layoffs are coming from: biotech.
“San Francisco needs to diversify like Los Angeles or Fresno, both of whom gained jobs overall in recent years despite suffering some losses. All these recent losses prove that.”
More job losses in the Bay area are expected in the coming months.
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Author: Evan Symon
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