GlobalFoundries this week quantified the number of employees it plays to lay off in the coming weeks to cut its operating expenses due to softening chip demand. The company will cut less than 800 employees globally by the end of December. The job cuts will mainly involve non-manufacturing roles.
Thomas Caulfield, chief executive of GlobalFoundries, told employees at a virtual meeting that workers in the U.S. and Singapore will be notified next week. Meanwhile, workers in Germany will be notified about their layoffs later. He did not quantify how many people will be let go in the U.S., Germany, and Singapore. Still, he emphasized that the company would focus primarily on cutting non-manufacturing roles, though some fab workers would also be laid off.
GlobalFoundries employs around 14,000 worldwide, so 800 people represent around 5.7% of the company’s global staff, notes VTDigger.
“As part of a recent all-employee meeting, we shared the cost saving actions we are taking across our business in response to the current macroeconomic environment including reducing corporate and manufacturing overhead costs as well as selectively reducing our workforce by less than 800 employees globally before the end of the year,” Julie Moynehan, a spokesperson for the company, wrote in an email to VTDigger.
It is unclear whether 800 positions globally is the total number of job cuts or the number of layoffs for the calendar year 2022.
Meanwhile, the layoffs are said to allow GlobalFoundries to save some $200 million per year, which may not sound much in the grand scheme of things. However, the world’s No. 4 contract maker of chips wants to stay profitable now that it is a public company after years of bleeding money when it was a private company controlled by Mubadala, a sovereign state-owned investment fund of Abu Dhabi.
GlobalFoundries serves over 200 customers and has five manufacturing sites on different continents. Amid the 2020 ~ 2021 chip demand boom, GlobalFoundries announced significant plans to expand the production capacities of its fabs in Germany, Singapore, and the U.S. In addition, GlobalFoundries revealed it would build an all-new fab in Malta, New York, in a private-public partnership to support growing demand, but never revealed any additional details.