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Tech Company Lays Off 5,500 Workers

It joins a litany of other companies like Microsoft and Intuit, the maker of TurboTax, that have used AI as justification for the mass culling of its workforce.

The layoffs at Cisco came to light in a notice posted with the Securities and Exchange Commission this week, affecting seven percent of its staff.

In a short statement, CEO Chuck Robbins used the term "AI" five times, highlighting the company's efforts to keep up in the ongoing AI race.

Earlier this year, Cisco also laid off 4,000 or five percent of it staff, saying that the company wanted to "realign the organization and enable further investment in key priority areas."

In short, companies are no longer hiding their optimism over replacing human labor with AI, an unfortunate reality for those looking to maintain a stable job. But whether this "realignment" will pay off in the long run remains to be seen.

Posted on August 19, 2024