Silicon Valley's tech giants have continued layoffs. From Meta to Amazon, 570 big tech companies have laid off 168,918 staff this year so far, according to Layoffs.fyi, a website that tracks such announcements.
While the layoffs have happened globally, some tech giants are struggling to let people go in European countries, as labour laws are stringent in many European countries.
In some European countries, the firms cannot just fire staff without discussing the matter with "employee interest globally".
As per their law, "companies are legally required to consult with these councils before executing layoffs, which involves a potentially time-consuming process of data collection, discussions, and the option of appealing".
In view of this, search engine giant Google and e-commerce major Amazon are reportedly asking employees to resign voluntarily.
Google is seeking help from these groups in France and Germany to resolve the layoffs issues, Bloomberg reported. Google parent company Alphabet Inc is conducting talks with employees in France asking them to quit voluntarily and get good severance packages in return.
Because of these requirements, Google branches in Germany and France will be some of the last locations to be affected by the cuts, if even at all, Bloomberg quoted a person in the know of it as saying.
Likewise, Amazon is also resorting to offering some of its senior managers a severance package of one-year if they resign voluntarily. The e-commerce giant is also offering, "leave to departing employees so their shares can vest and be paid out as bonuses," the report added.
In Germany too, Amazon is sacking employees who are on their probationary periods along with offering them an option to resign voluntarily.
Apart from this, an estimated 500 out of 8,000 Google employees will have to leave in the UK where labor protections are not as stringent. Additionally, Google is also looking at sacking a few employees in Dublin and in Zurich, where unions said the number of layoffs affects more than 200 people, the Bloomberg report said.
Last week, Amazon laid off about 100 employees in its video game divisio