Meta is considering a new round of layoffs that could affect 20% or more of its workforce as the company invests heavily in AI infrastructure and anticipates efficiency gains from AI-assisted workers, three sources familiar with the plans told Reuters.
No timeline has been set and the final scope of the cuts has not been determined. Meta employed nearly 79,000 people as of Dec. 31.
A reduction of that scale would mark the company’s largest since its 2022 to 2023 “year of efficiency,” when it eliminated more than 21,000 jobs.
A Meta spokesperson called the report “speculative.”
CEO Mark Zuckerberg has recently intensified Meta’s push into generative AI, offering large compensation packages to recruit researchers for a new superintelligence team. Last June, Meta paid $14.3 billion to acquire a 49% stake in Scale AI and hired its CEO, Alexandr Wang, as its chief AI officer.
More recently, it acquired Manus AI and Moltbook, the new AI agent social network that went viral, to further build out its AI operations.
Meta plans to invest $600 billion into building data centers by 2028.