IT Giant Cisco Will Fire 4000 Employees: 5% Workforce To Be Slashed, But Not For Cutting Costs

The digital communications technology conglomerate Cisco Systems is another giant joining the list of Big Tech companies around the globe laying off masses.

According to a recent report, the California-based networking giant will fire over 4,000 employees, which is about 5% of its workforce just after the company reported its largest quarterly revenue of $13.63 billion in the first quarter earning report of fiscal 2023.

While the company’s executive management have not related the job cuts to cost savings, such a massive lay-off will impact the employee confidence, especially in the ongoing season of job layoffs.

The Chairman and CEO of the US-based tech major, Chuck Robbins did not share any details on this job-cuts report released by Silicon Valley Business Journal, but he did confirm that there will be a mass firing in the company.

According to the report, Cisco will fire almost 4,100 employees, or nearly 5% of its total employee pool, which stands at a strong 83,000 headcount globally.

Regarding the job cuts, Chuck Robbins says, “We would be reluctant to go into a lot of detail here until we’re able to talk to them. I would say that what we’re doing is rightsizing certain businesses. The people impact is difficult … it’s always a difficult decision, but we have a lot of opportunity. There’s nothing that’s a lower priority, but we are rightsizing certain businesses.”

The company’s Chief Financial Officer Scott Herren termed the layoffs as a ‘rebalancing’ act. He suggested everyone to not consider the headcount action to be motivated by cost savings, rather called it a ‘rebalancing act’. 

“As we look across the board, there are areas that we would like to invest in more, Chuck just talked about them. Security, our move to platforms and more cloud-delivered products,” Herren said at Cisco’s earnings call to the analysts.

“We’re going to be working really hard to help match our employees to those roles to the extent there’s a skill match. So, we’re going to work really hard at that,” he added.