Satellite Internet firm Viasat is shedding about 300 jobs from its global workforce — including 72 at its Carlsbad, California, headquarters and another 35 remote workers based in the state.
The company confirmed the layoffs after filing Worker Retraining and Adjustment Notification Act (WARN) paperwork with state and local employment officials earlier this month.
In a statement, Viasat said the job cuts amount to roughly 4 percent of its global headcount. California employees were given the required 60-day notice at the end of March, with the layoffs becoming permanent on June 2.
Local job losses spanned a range of technical positions, including software, hardware and network engineers. As part the WARN notice, Viasat said four workers also were let go from its San Jose office.
"The decision was taken after extensive review of staffing needs and review of our strategic business focus areas," according to the company. "We made these changes to align our going-forward headcount with our current and anticipated workload following the divestiture of the Link 16 Tactical Data Links business to L3 Harris earlier this year."
Viasat is in the throes of a pivot as it expands globally and doubles down on putting more bandwidth in space. It sold off its long-time military tactical radio business to L3 Harris for nearly $2 billion, using the proceeds to reduce debt.
Meanwhile, the company is preparing for the launch of the first of three new terabit-class Internet satellites. ViaSat-3 Americas is scheduled to blast off on Tuesdayfrom Cape Canaveral, Florida. It will boost bandwidth to help Viasat better compete with Starlink, a fast-growing satellite Internet provider owned by Elon's Musk's SpaceX.
The two other ViaSat-3 satellites— each with more than 1,000-gigabit per second of capacity — are expected to launch starting this fall. The first will serve Europe, the Middle East and Africa, while the second targets the Asia Pacific region.
Along with these new satellites, Viasat is acquiring United Kingdom satellite operator Inmarsat in a stock, cash and assumption-of-debt transaction valued at roughly $6 billion. The combination bulks up Viasat in key markets such as maritime and in-flight Wi-Fi where Starlink is making a push. The merger is under review by European anti-monopoly regulators.
Viasat's shares closed on Wednesday up slightly at $35.12 on the Nasdaq exchange.
