Cisco likely to slash thousands of jobs next week

[Anta Assamey]

Global networking giant Cisco is reportedly geared up to lay off “thousands” of employees next week, as the company pivots to focus on “high-growth areas".

Cisco is expected to report its Q2 2024 earnings on February 14 and the layoff announcement is likely to be made during the earnings, reports Reuters.

Cisco did not comment on the potential job cuts.

Cisco last year issued layoff notices to nearly 4,000 employees, as the company rolled out efforts to “rebalance” and cut costs.

The networking company had a total employee count of 84,900 as of its fiscal 2023, according to reports.

In September last year, Cisco laid off 350 employees in the Silicon Valley in the US in its latest job cut round.

The company in November 2022 announced to slash about 5 per cent of its workforce, around 4,000 jobs.

The company had said in a statement that these “recent notifications are part of the rebalancing effort we began in November 2022, which included a limited restructuring impacting our real estate portfolio and approximately 5 per cent of our workforce”.

The layoffs in November were part of a $600 million restructuring plan.

“This rebalancing is about prioritising investments in our transformation, to meet and exceed our customers' expectations in the changing technology landscape,” the company had said.

For its full fiscal 2023 year, Cisco generated sales of $57 billion.