Meta To Slash Employees Count, Its Workplace Said (instagram)
Meta employee force could see a lay off in the metaverse silicon unit on Wednesday, today. Meta has plans to lay off its employees in the metaverse-oriented Reality Labs division which is focused on making custom silicon, Reuters reported as sources who were in the know said. The employees were told of this through a post on the internal discussion and communication forum that connects the employees in the company at Meta known as the Workplace.
The post at Workplace said that the employees would be told of their status by early Wednesday morning, the sources said. The layoff which would affect the Silicon Unit – Facebook Agile Silicon Team, or FAST was not known. Reuters reported that the Meta spokesperson declined to give a number on the plans.
In March, Mark Zuckerberg had said that year’s bulk layoffs would happen in spring but, “in a small number of cases, it may take through the end of the year to complete these changes.”
Depending on the lay-offs, if the lay-offs are large, it could curb the progress of Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg”s projects of building products, with augmented and virtual reality, which could open access to immersive virtual worlds known as the “metaverse”, specially in the case of AR glasses that Mr. Zuckerberg has talked about, predicting that “will redefine our relationship with technology,” said the Reuters.
The FAST unit of Meta, has close to 600 employees who have been part of making custom chip to equip Meta’s devices for better performance of the unique tasks and in operational efficiency, which has differentiated them from the others entering the AR/VR market. Meta has also undergone struggles in making chips that could compete with external providers, with Meta turning to chipmaker Qualcomm technologies to make chips for its devices which are presently in the market.
With a new executive at Meta, the restructuring of the company was in the pipeline. One of Meta’s division, which was focused on artificial intelligence has had roadblocks, with an executive in that division leaving, though the company has a new executive in charge now.
Last week, in its annual Connect conference, the company had announced about the new versions of the smart glasses and its consumer-oriented Quest headset, Quest 3. Of now, it makes, mixed reality headsets, Quest and smart glasses with Ray-Ban eyeglass maker EssilorLuxottica. Through a new AI virtual assistant, this can stream videos and speak with the wearers.
Meta is also working on technically challenging, but less bulky AR glasses which could look like normal glasses and also with smart watches though currently the company is not planning for a wide availability of these, Reuters reported sources saying.
Since last November, Meta has seen a lay off of around 21,000 employees as a part of controlling the costs.
