Snap plans to lay off 20 percent of employees | Hacker News Reader

Snap plans to lay off 20 percent of employees

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120 pointstempsy30 comments

Layoff is no surprise, 20% is a chunk though, 1280 people. I admire their trying to make new hardware but its new drone, Pixy, was very underwhelming. Could have sub contracted that out or cobranded with existing maker and got a better, cheaper device.

Worth noting that Snap more than doubled its payroll since 2020 and is now at 6400+ employees. All the tech layoffs happening these days are a minor correction to the rampant overhiring which took place industry-wide since the start of the pandemic, very similar to stock market trends.

> its new drone, Pixy, was very underwhelming

It's an unfortunately missed opportunity.

I am completely outside their normal user base, I've literally never had a snapchat account and don't use any social media.

However, when I heard about the concept it was something I immediately wanted, I have for some time wanted a drone which could be used for very adhoc simple selfie/group pics while traveling, something with basically the exact features snap was talking about when they announced it, unfortunately, as we all know, the actual implementation fell far short. Huge miss for them I think, the market for that could have been huge if executed properly.

The opportunity has always been there. The company, like many before them, simply ran into the limits of physics.

Why physics? The failure seemed to be more grounded in regular technological limits (software/hardware/batteries) than anything truly immutable.

Agent battery limitations, physics?

I've had recent discussions with IT people who have been laid off or fear a layoff.

Inflation's raging. The Fed is raising rates to stem it. The market is in bear territory.

Economic conditions had been favorable for a very long time. Reversion to the mean is inevitable. Buckle up.

People see these headlines and think that the job market is loosening. But growth tech is such a small percentage of overall employment, it effectively doesn't matter.

Only if big tech does layoffs is it meaningful for national employment numbers. Fed will have to go much harder to fix the broken job market

> Fed will have to go much harder to fix the broken job market

Fed wants to break the job market, to reduce wage inflation.

Yes, and they will. Despite the wishful thinking to the contrary. It could have been prevented with more responsible monetary policy in 2021

This thread is people talking past each other on varying definitions of “breaking.”

I think much earlier than 2021. As soon as the first COVID stimulus dollar went out, there should have been an inflation mitigation plan.

Are we forgetting reckless printing of money during 2020 and the purposeful lack of oversight (Small government! Down with regulations!) that resulted in basically looting of the treasury?

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/16/business/economy/covid-pa...

Not to whataboutism here, there is an argument to be made in this case, but let's not selective eh.

SNAP's market is dwindling, they have not been posting good quarterly reports, so this should come as no surprise to anyone why they're slashing this many jobs.

All part of the business of being publicly owned. If you can't sustain the growth then you better start trimming the fat.

Has SNAP ever been profitable? It looks like it made $MM this year? https://techcrunch.com/2022/02/03/snap-finally-did-it-yall/

I think it raised $5B in various funding rounds?

It's been around a decade, and if its cutting 20% I can't imaging the future is bright?

Just another flash in the pan. Three years after the kids move on, the markets will too

The same law applies to private companies. They are under board scrutiny instead of board + market scrutiny.

it is over for snap chat, user base is dwindling, it is the new myspace

>> Snap’s user base has continued to grow strongly — it has 347 million daily users, which is more than Twitter — but it has managed to turn a profit only once since it went public in 2017

Anecdotally, I am in snap's target demographic, and a lot of people I know have snap but either don't use it or only use it to keep up their streaks.

Yeah, that will die off too. Many of us were trying to be mayors on FourSquare, but with time you realize the virtual accolades are a meaningless waste of time.

instead of "learn to code", laid off workers will soon be told "learn to make wind turbines"

the IT revolution is over for now

Doubtful. Most of these employees will have new gigs doing similar work within 1-2 months.

If that long.

I'm literally going through my network on LinkedIn right now, making a list of people I know who currently work at Snap to send to my company's recruiters.

Engineers - yes. Other job functions don't always have such an easy time.

I generally agree, but I think Snap probably hires good people. I bet they all do fine within 1-2 months.

Recent experience or case study to link?

Recent experience with from COVID-related layoffs. No one I know spent more than 2 months on the market.

But also, stop being a know-it-all empiricism addict. just use your head. Snap is a company with a high-hiring bar and plenty of competition that's still hiring. Of course they'll be scooped up by competition, even if only to prevent them from going to competitors.

This comment screams Reddit-brain

Source: Trust me bro

"Learn to mine ore"

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