Google to axe hundreds of jobs

The US tech giant is understood to be cutting jobs at its voice assistant unit as well as the hardware divisions responsible for Pixel, Nest and Fitbit.

It was widely reported that James Park and Eric Friedman, who founded Fitbit, were also leaving. Google acquired the health tracker for $2.1bn in 2021.

In a statement, Google told Reuters: "Throughout the second half of 2023, a number of our teams made changes to become more efficient and work better, and to align their resources to their biggest product priorities.

"Some teams are continuing to make these kinds of organisational changes, which includes some role eliminations globally."

Tech companies went on a hiring spree during the pandemic to meet a surge in demand for digital services.

Since then, however, they have been looking to cut back on costs and headcount as demand eased off.

In January last year, Alphabet announced plans to cut 6% of its global workforce, around 12,000 jobs, while Amazon cut around 27,000 roles.

Earlier this week it was reported that Amazon was planning to lay off hundreds of staff across Twitch, Prime Video and MGM Studios.

Shares in Alphabet, Google's parent company, were up 1% in pre-market trading as at 1145 GMT.