For Google, this is the latest in an increasing number of layoffs since last year. Last week, there were “hundreds” laid off from the hardware, Google Assistant, and AR divisions. Before that, there were layoffs in Google News, and before that, layoffs came to recruiting, Waze, Waymo, a robot division, and generally all across Google.
The Business Insider report has the full staff memo that Philipp Schindler, Google’s chief business officer, sent to the staff announcing the layoffs. The memo doesn’t reference AI as a reason for the layoffs, but given the previous report, it seems that Googlers are now working to put some of their co-workers out of a job. This will be one of the first of what’s expected to be a wave of generative AI job cuts across the industry.