American cloud-based, science research and development startup Benchling has reportedly laid off 9% of its workforce, according to a Reuters report. With this, the company joins a growing number of companies, especially in the tech sector, that have trimmed their workforce amid a grim global economic outlook.
Citing the company’s spokesperson, the media report added that the move will impact 74 employees. Details about the severance package and other benefits to the affected employees at Benchling are not clear at the moment.
Founded in 2012 by Sajith Wickramasekara and Ashu Singhal and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Benchling allows researchers to manage and track experiments, share data, and collaborate on research projects. The major player in a niche and growing market for digitizing the R&D process was last valued at over $6 billion, according to the Reuters report.
With this, Benchling has joined several tech companies including, Mark Zuckerberg-led Meta, Elon Musk-led Twitter, and Satya Nadella-led Microsoft, among others, who have laid off thousands of employees in an attempt to gear up for a global economic slowdown. In a nutshell, a setback in consumer spending due to high inflation and interest rates along with the threat of a looming recession this year has pushed corporates to keep a lid on their spending.
Google’s parent Alphabet announced to cut 12,000 jobs, or around 6% of its workforce, in January to lower its costs. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and Whatsapp, has laid off a total of around 21,000 employees in two rounds of layoffs and is reportedly planning to cut around 4,000 jobs in its third round of layoff this month.
