It's very weird that Mozilla is laying off 25% of its workforce while at the same time spending oodles of cash on its Fix The Internet incubator. I'm not a business major; maybe this is normal.
Of course, perhaps they will also cut future funding to this incubator, and it's just a different timing that they announce it.
Mozilla’s layoffs were to get rid of the highly paid engineers, IMO. We have new talent coming in fresh and loose for a bunch less.
We also have a lot of cash in the bank. Mozilla is wealthy. CFO was asked to increase runway.
I agree that the pay in The Netherlands is pretty bad for software devs compared to other countries with similar wealth (UK, Germany, US, etc), but I know that it’s much worse in e.g. Eastern European countries, which I also expect Mozilla to hire from.
There are a couple other factors - one extra factor is this is just for entry-level employees, another extra factor is that Mozilla probably doesn't pay quite as well as Google. I am not sure how large those factors are, but it's just an estimate and they work against each other, so I think the range is a reasonable guess. I would be surprised if it's very far off.
At most it's just brain drain from around the world (and around the U.S.) due to capital concentration NOT talent concentration.
There's this belief that anybody who isn't willing to move to high COL metro couldn't cut it there because having a worldview outside of living in SF or similar isn't something that can be fathomed.
Brain drain implies relative talent concentration - are you sure this is what you mean to say?
Look - I hate SV and don't live there. The reality is unavoidable: for software, the best talent lives in the Bay. It's not that deep.
I'll go with the world.
Microsoft has brilliant engineers and is in Seattle, for example.
What about Tencent? and things like HK's HFT
What about competitive security? here's huge variety in countries e.g 2 very strong teams are Poland based
Let's take three others that make well-known desktop browsers: https://www.levels.fyi/?compare=Apple,Google,Microsoft&track...
According to that data, senior developers at Apple (ICT4), Google (L5) and Microsoft (64) make on average $320k, $352k, and $225k. Their fully-loaded costs (benefits, payroll taxes, office space, etc) to the company will of course be even higher.
These are examples of peer companies Mozilla is competing against for employees. As I explained at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24138083 , Mozilla does not try to attract people solely via compensation. However, you can only offer so much less before you're no longer able to hire and retain the talent you need.
You can infer from the foundation tax returns that most of the assets are held by the corporation: https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2018/mozilla-2018-fo...
It's the assets held directly by the foundation that have implications for their tax status, and they only move assets to that status as necessary.
And conveniently, the people directing the Corp are the ones setting the agenda for the org (which that agenda is the thing the Corp has a fiduciary duty towards...).
I'm not opposed to nonprofits creating systems to make sure donor money is handled appropriately, but it seems to me there's something seriously wrong with the current structure. In hard times, organizations generally need to focus on their core initiatives, not branch out even more!
The way that we viewed it at my previous company was basically it's two different businesses, two different P&L's and two different sets of metrics and KPIs. You could see them as two different business units that can succeed or fail independently.
If one Business Unit is struggling, you can't just fill the holes by taking funds from another BU to fill the gap. You need to solve the inherent profitability problems in the struggling Business Unit in some other way, typically by selling more, increasing the price/mix or reducing the cost.
Don't know if this is how Mozilla reasons, but this was definitely the way we reasoned in the last two large corporations I worked for.
While the Mozilla corporation is for profit entity , the goals of the foundation and reason Mozilla foundation /corporation exists is not to make or maximise profit .
Non profits generally run on the principles of sustainability I.e are they spending more than endowments or they drawing on the principal amount etc.
In Mozilla case drop in revenue/ donations resulting in cancelled projects is per se not abnormal , but which projects are shelved depends on how the mission is interpreted.
It is perfectly within the foundation remit to infuse capital into the corporation if they had more money and they also believed the work of the corporation is more important than some foundation projects to the overall foundation’s mission.
Just like NASA cancels other projects when one project like JWST goes a lot overbudget , with approvals from congress if required .
Clearly the foundation did not think corporation projects were worth saying over others , we can debate that , but they did and do have that choice
Sure but that's the case here.
If Google are stopping the money then FF is like a person with no money taken in by Google and hooked on drugs; once they're kicked out they can't fund the habit and reliance on Google has meant they've not had to find ways to fund themselves.
I realised Google held the cards, but hadn't twigged on how the excessive nature of the funding made Firefox/Mozilla weaker.
Unless FF were aware of how that might go and put half of their Google money into investments?
I mean I'm looking at the leadership page and all I can ask myself is do you need to pay that many executives just to build a web browser?
I'd be fascinated to know how much it costs Apple to develop Safari, a browser multiple times more successful than Firefox judging by Wikipedia. Just a hunch but I'd bet money it's a fraction of the cost of running this bloated pseudo-charity.
Best thing for the internet is for current Mozilla to fade out fast and something more sustainable be built from the technology remains.
edit: Really, could you please not do that? Asking "Is the search deal not expiring?" is even worse than the earlier comment...
I mean unless we're going back to phoenix days it seems like Google's money both saved and potentially secured Firefox's demise.
Re the speculation that the Google money is stopping (AIUI its something of the order 90% of income) Mozilla seem to be hunting for all and any revenue streams and urgently cutting costs. They look like they're preparing for it to stop, and I get the impression they want to be self-sufficient. It strikes me (and recall I have little knowledge of their financials - perhaps they've put a lot of income aside) they need to be self-sufficient in order to not be scared to follow a privacy route that could readily [probably has already IMO] annoy Google. Google aren't giving them $X00 Million for fun, I feel. The less useable data, and sellable users, Mozilla directs their way the less useful Mozilla is to Google.
(Perhaps there's also a benefit in keeping FF to prevent the appearance of Chrome being a monopoly.)
e: to your edit.
I'm not sure what is wrong with the question. My understanding is that the search deal is expiring and is the source of most of the FF related revenue.
If that is not the case I'd like to know. It seems like a reasonable question.
pbhjpbhj's comment did predicate the speculation with an "If". And Mozilla has already had two rounds of layoffs this year ostensibly because of declining revenue. I think speculation on what will happen if the search deal is not renewed is reasonable.
I do appreciate pointing out that we do not know this will expire.
Basically, part of situation analysis is that you have to evaluate the future potential of your projects and where your investment dollars go. Businesses are always thinking of the future, and that includes non-profits.
The Boston Consulting Group matrix is one tool that might fit this scenario: https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/st...
The scenario you describe might be analogous to this hypothetical example: let’s say Microsoft laid off its entire Microsoft Surface team, and simultaneously invested $10 billion into Microsoft Azure. You might think, what the heck, the Surface lineup are good products that seem to be profitable (I actually have no clue if they are).
But, perhaps the Surface product line is a dog. It’s a low-market share product in a low-growth market. Azure might be a star: it has a large portion of a fast-growing market, and deserves more investment.
Even though Mozilla is a non-profit, I think it’s clear that they are looking to diversify their income stream. The “fix the internet” incubator can probably come up with services in high-growth markets that are less costly to implement and more easily monetized than a web browser (and fit their organizational goal of improving the Internet).