Tag Archives: Marc Benioff

Business

Amazon Layoffs to Hit Over 17,000 Workers, the Most in Recent Tech Wave

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Amazon.

AMZN -0.79%

com Inc.’s layoffs will affect more than 17,000 employees, according to people familiar with the matter, the highest reduction tally revealed in the past year at a major technology company as the industry pares back amid economic uncertainty.

The Seattle-based company in November said that it was beginning layoffs among its corporate workforce, with cuts concentrated on its devices business, recruiting and retail operations. At the time, The Wall Street Journal reported the cuts would total about 10,000 people. Thousands of those cuts began last year.

The rest of the cuts will bring the total number of layoffs to more than 17,000 and will be made over the coming weeks, some of the people said. As of September,

Amazon

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employed 1.5 million people, with a large percentage of them in its warehouses. The layoffs are concentrated in the company’s corporate ranks, some of the people said.

Amazon

was one of the biggest beneficiaries of the Covid-19 pandemic as customers flocked to online shopping. The rush to Amazon’s various businesses, from e-commerce to groceries and cloud computing, pushed forward years of growth for the company. To keep up with demand, Amazon doubled its logistics network and added hundreds of thousands of employees.

When demand started to wane with customers moving back to shopping in stores, Amazon initiated a broad cost-cutting review to pare back on units that were unprofitable, the Journal reported. In the spring and summer, the company made targeted cuts to bring down costs, shutting physical stores and business units such as Amazon Care. Amazon later announced a companywide hiring freeze before deciding to let employees go.

Many tech companies have cut jobs as the economy sours. Amazon’s layoffs of more than 17,000 employees would represent the highest number of people let go by a tech company in the past few months, according to tallies released on Layoffs.fyi, a website that tracks the events as they surface in media reports and company releases.

The trend has affected companies such as Amazon and others that have acknowledged they grew too quickly in many cases.

Facebook

parent

Meta Platforms Inc.

said it would cut more than 11,000 workers, or 13% of its staff, adding to layoffs at

Lyft Inc.,

HP Inc.

and other tech companies. On Wednesday,

Salesforce Inc.

said that it was laying off 10% of its workforce. Co-Chief Executive

Marc Benioff

said the business-software provider hired too many people as revenue surged earlier in the pandemic. “I take responsibility for that,” he said.

Write to Dana Mattioli at dana.mattioli@wsj.com and Jessica Toonkel at jessica.toonkel@wsj.com

Copyright ©2022 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

Appeared in the January 5, 2023, print edition as ‘Amazon Layoffs To Exceed Initial Reports.’

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Business

Salesforce promotes Bret Taylor to co-CEO

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Salesforce’s Bret Taylor at Dreamforce 2017

Salesforce

Salesforce on Tuesday promoted Bret Taylor to the role of co-CEO, alongside Marc Benioff, who co-founded the company in 1999.

Taylor joined Salesforce in 2016, through the $412 million acquisition of his productivity software start-up Quip, which he co-founded four years earlier. Taylor quickly moved up the ranks to become president and chief product officer, and he now participates in quarterly earnings calls with analysts.

“Bret is a phenomenal industry leader who has been instrumental in creating incredible success for our customers and driving innovation throughout our company,” Benioff said, in a press release announcing the promotion. “Together, Bret and I will lead Salesforce through our next chapter, while living our shared values of trust, customer success, innovation and equality for all.”

Before starting Quip, Taylor helped create Google Maps, sold social networking start-up FriendFeed to Facebook, and spent three years as Facebook’s technology chief. Taylor sits on Twitter’s board of directors, and on Monday was named chairman as part of Jack Dorsey’s departure as CEO.

Taylor received $13.9 million in total compensation for the 2021 fiscal year, mostly from stock awards, according to Salesforce’s most recent proxy statement. He owns about $329 million worth of Salesforce shares, according to FactSet. Taylor received Salesforce stock in exchange for his Quip holdings.

The last time Benioff named another CEO of Salesforce came in 2018, when former Oracle executive Keith Block became co-CEO alongside Benioff. But Block stepped down less than two years later, and Benioff removed the “co” from his title.

Taylor told people he was expecting to get the CEO job soon, the Information reported on Oct. 7.

“Marc has been my mentor, my greatest supporter and my trusted friend for years,” he said in Tuesday’s statement. “Partnering with him to lead the company he co-founded 22 years ago is an enormous privilege.”

Salesforce is the largest employer in San Francisco, drawing tens of thousands of attendees each year to its Dreamforce conference, where Benioff expounds on business trends. Benioff regularly engages in politics, directs money to philanthropic causes and, with his wife, Lynne, acquired ownership of Time Magazine from Meredith Corp in 2018.

Salesforce has expanded beyond its core of providing cloud-based software for sales reps, with products for customer service, marketing and commerce. Acquisitions of MuleSoft, Tableau and most recently Slack have also helped Salesforce grow.

Last year, Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield told Taylor that Slack was interested in acquiring Quip from Salesforce. Taylor told Butterfield that wasn’t happening, but he later brought up the idea of Salesforce buying Slack, according to a regulatory filing. The $27.1 billion deal closed in July.

Taylor graduated from Stanford

WATCH: Jim Cramer’s interview with Marc Benioff

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Business

Salesforce Will Help Workers Worried About Abortion Access Move

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Photo: Stephen Lam (Getty Images)

Salesforce made one of the biggest moves in the tech industry in light of a highly restrictive Texas abortion law on Friday. In a message to employees on Slack, the company said it would help them and their immediate families relocate if they are worried about access to reproductive healthcare in their state.

Although the message, which was obtained by CNBC, appeared not to single out Texas, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff later went on Twitter to explicitly say the company would help any employees move from the state. Nonetheless, CNBC reported that Salesforce did not take a stance on the law in its Slack message, emphasizing that it respected different views but also stood in solidarity with women.

“These are incredibly personal issues that directly impact many of us — especially women,” Salesforce said. “The company did not take a stance on the law. “We recognize and respect that we all have deeply held and different perspectives. As a company, we stand with all of our women at Salesforce and everywhere.”

Salesforce has offices in Dallas, according to its corporate website. A CNBC analysis of LinkedIn profiles found that about 2,000 people work for the company in Dallas.

Tech companies have come under scrutiny in recent weeks for their silence on the Texas abortion law. The law bans abortions after six weeks, a time when most women don’t even realize they’re pregnant, and allows individuals to sue anyone who helps women get an abortion after the authorized period.

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A small number of tech companies have spoken out or taken action, while others have had their views revealed by Texas politicians.

Uber and Lyft announced they would cover all legal fees for drivers sued for taking women to get abortions. Bumble said it was setting up a relief fund to finance organizations supporting women’s reproductive rights in the state. Meanwhile, Shar Dubey, the CEO of Match Group, which owns Tinder and Hinge, said she was personally creating a fund that would help Match employees in Texas obtain abortions elsewhere.

GoDaddy, for its part, booted a site from its servers that aims to help Texas anonymously snitch on people who have abortions after six weeks or anyone who assists them.

Then you have Elon Musk, who heads Tesla and SpaceX. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said in an interview that Musk liked the social policies in the state, which the CEO did not confirm or deny.

“In general, I believe government should rarely impose its will upon the people, and, when doing so, should aspire to maximize their cumulative happiness,” Musk tweeted. “That said, I would prefer to stay out of politics.”



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