Facebook owner Meta to cut 13% of global workforce

In a message to employees, chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said the company will be letting go of more than 11,000 people. Those affected will be paid 16 weeks of base pay plus two additional weeks for every year of service, with no cap.

In the US, Meta will continue to cover the cost of healthcare for people and their families for six months.

"We are also taking a number of additional steps to become a leaner and more efficient company by cutting discretionary spending and extending our hiring freeze through Q1," Zuckerberg said.

"Not only has online commerce returned to prior trends, but the macroeconomic downturn, increased competition, and ads signal loss have caused our revenue to be much lower than I’d expected. I got this wrong, and I take responsibility for that."

Meta highlighted a "meaningful cultural shift" in how it operates. For example, it said it will be transitioning to desk-sharing for people who already spend most of their time outside the office. The firm is also extending its hiring freeze through the first quarter, with a small number of exceptions.

"I’m going to watch our business performance, operational efficiency, and other macroeconomic factors to determine whether and how much we should resume hiring at that point," Zuckerberg said.

"This will give us the ability to control our cost structure in the event of a continued economic downturn. It will also put us on a path to achieve a more efficient cost structure than we outlined to investors recently."

Last week, Elon Musk took an axe to nearly half the jobs at Twitter after completing his $44bn takeover of the social media platform.

At 1215 GMT, Meta shares were up 4.6% in pre-market trade at $100.90.

Susannah Streeter, senior investment and markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "Mark Zuckerberg’s ‘mea culpa’ statement is unlikely to do the trick of reassuring investors, instead they may be further rattled by his admission he over-estimated the company’s prospects. It’s clear he expected the surge in online advertising experienced during the pandemic to continue and under-estimated just how quickly rivals could entice users away.

"Given that the jobs cuts were already expected and had largely been priced in, the focus will now be on the monumental task Meta faces to claw back revenue. It faces an uphill battle in its attempt to attract younger audiences who are now dancing to the Pied Piper tunes of TikTok, or setting up groups and channels on Discord and Telegram.

"At the same time Meta funds are being poured down into the dark plumbing of the metaverse, and it’s highly unclear when revenues will emerge from this expensive venture. He may have taken responsibility for the current situation, but he is still using the same language of shifting resources to high priority growth areas, and the metaverse still features on that list."