As companies like Alphabet, Meta and Amazon slash tens of thousands of jobs, Apple stands alone as a major U.S. tech company that’s avoided mass layoffs. Nor is it planning to follow its Big Tech peers by slashing jobs, with Apple CEO Tim Cook calling them a “last resort” in a television interview Thursday.
Cook told CNBC that “mass layoffs is not something that we’re talking about at this moment,” though he did not rule out the possibility entirely.
Apple did not hire as many employees during the pandemic-era tech boom, which means less pressure to cut labor costs as the bubble deflates. Apple’s workforce grew by around 19.7% between 2020 and 2022, according to CNBC calculations.
By comparison, Meta increased its workforce by 60% in just 2020 and 2021. Since last November, the social media company has announced layoffs totaling 21,000 jobs.
Still, economic headwinds are affecting Apple’s plans, with Cook telling CNBC that it was hiring “at a lower clip level than we were before.”
Nor has Apple entirely avoided cutting some jobs, trimming a small number of employees in its corporate retail division in early April, reported Bloomberg. The company also reportedly delayed bonuses.
Yet the company has not matched the tens of thousands of jobs slashed by Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon. Over 189,000 jobs have been cut in the tech sector so far this year, according to tracker layoffs.fyi, already more than the entirety of 2022.
A 'good quarter'
Apple reported $94.8 billion in quarterly revenue on Thursday. While the result was the company’s second straight quarter of falling sales, the decline was smaller than analysts expected. Apple shares rose 2.5% in after-hours trading following the earnings release.
Apple’s revenue was buoyed by iPhone sales, which grew 1.5% year-on-year. Demand for the company’s other products sank, with iPad and Mac revenue falling 13% and 31% year-on-year respectively.
Cook called the results a “good quarter from an iPhone point of view” on CNBC, given a slump in the overall smartphone market. Consumers are buying fewer smartphones, PCs and other consumer electronics, hurting both device manufacturers and chipmakers.
Qualcomm, which supplies chips to Apple and other smartphone makers, reported a 17% year-on-year drop in quarterly revenue on Wednesday, with CEO Cristiano Amon saying the company had yet to see a recovery in demand.
During Apple’s earnings call, Cook pointed to India as a future driver of iPhone sales. “What I do see in India is a lot of people entering the middle class,” Cook said, expressing hope that Apple “can convince some number of them to buy an iPhone.” The company opened its first retail stores in India in April.
