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Google lays off hundreds in hardware, voice assistant teams
- gennarro 3y agoRelated: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38947224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38947224
- mymacbook 3y agoThis impacted far more orgs including Maps/Search in addition to HW, AR, and Voice.
- googledtnifzn 3y agoI can confirm this.
- TotoHorner 3y agodoes Google have a hiring freeze right now?
- Xlythe 3y agoThey've had one ongoing since Q3 2022 in my org.
- crossroadsguy 3y agoThe recruiter who reached out to me, two months ago, said as a disclaimer -- there is a possibility that even if I get an offer the joining might happen only in 8-12 months. Felt bizarre.
- pokstad 3y agoIt’s amazing how much the industry leaders just copy each other. Google didn’t throw the towel in until Amazon did first.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- bryanrasmussen 3y agoIf one of google's working theories is they should hire people to keep them away from other organizations then it makes sense they don't fire until they see their competitors start.
- choppaface 3y agoThey probably tried to move as many as possible to Bard or to backfill Ads / Android etc but some of these are people who wouldn’t / couldn’t move. It mainly signals that upper management is not up to task and made bad bets. Fitbit was a great product and for Google to axe the founders says “we care about monetizing users not serving them.”
- bpye 3y ago> Fitbit was a great product and for Google to axe the founders says “we care about monetizing users not serving them.” Is this really a surprise to anyone at this point?
- choppaface 3y agoNo but there are a lot of Google employees who still believe e.g. Google makes the world a better place by owning all third party cookies.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- tdb7893 3y agoThat isn't an accurate characterization of these layoffs. They also laid people off in ads and just across all the orgs in general apparently. I'm hearing this from one of my friends in ads who got laid off.
- 3y ago
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- choppaface 3y agoNotably Fitbit and AR are now dead: https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/10/24033994/google-reorganization-fitbit-park-friedman-ar-layoffs https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/10/24033994/google-reorganiz...
- ajmurmann 3y agoIs there a good explanation for why Google started Pixel Watch when they already had FitBit? I would have understood a rebranding of FitBit to Pixel Watch, but it seems like that's not what happened.
- modeless 3y agoI'm sure Pixel Watch as a project predates the acquisition. Garden variety corporate turf war.
- refulgentis 3y agoCorrect-ish (that's public record so I don't feel bad saying it), but you all are underestimating the ability to level up a hardware division instantly with the kind of expertise Fitbit had, and brand name. Pixel Watch doesn't happen without Fitbit. Here, they seem to be just trimming the people up top, which I deeply support. These are millionaires
- choppaface 3y agoNot the entire answer but apparently Pixel watch massively outperformed Fitbit as of late: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/03/pixel-watch-sales-power-google-to-no-2-in-worldwide-wearables-marketshare/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/03/pixel-watch-sales-po...
- technofiend 3y agoEven so, if my wife's fitbit dies she'll get a Garmin watch despite the fact she's an Android user. Google will eventually drop support of their watches too. The company is just too fickle to trust.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- resolutebat 3y agoDupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38947224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38947224
- arnaudsm 3y agoI bet they'll rehire like crazy in AR once the Apple Vision Pro is a success. I miss when Google had vision instead of trend following lazily
- N3cr0ph4g1st 3y agoGet rid of Sundar.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Gow8876 3y agoHe may not be Sam Altman, but his position in Google is quite solid. His number is also good until chatgpt happened.
- ertian 3y agoDid it ever really have vision? Honestly, Google kinda seems like it suffers from ADHD: it bounces from one shiny new project to another, quickly losing interest in anything that doesn't immediately take off. In the old days, that was enough: their little experiments really _did_ take off. Now, in a more crowded field, it takes more discipline and focus to get things off the ground...and discipline and focus are two things that Google leadership seems to seriously lack.
- pkos98 3y agoWhich of their own projects took off? E.g. Android and Maps were acquisitions IIRC. Maybe Google+?
- ertian 3y agoHuh, I didn't know Maps was an acquisition! I've always had that chalked up in the 'internal project' category.
- jackvalentine 3y ago
- xyst 3y agoUseless C-level executives focusing on short term gains from RIFs rather than innovating. G is just a shadow of it’s former self. I can’t wait for the great G disruption
- asdfaoeu 3y agoOverall probably a good thing for the rest of us having all this talent starting new companies.
- guiriduro 3y agoG disruption already arrived, with ChatGPT and Bing copilot, search now has a superior challenger/disruptor it has lacked for over a decade of G incumbency.
- jzombie 3y agoYep. I personally use ChatGPT far more than Google search these days.
- gandalfgreybeer 3y agoI’ve started to do this more often recently as well. Do you employ any specific approach for prompting to get what you want more consistently?
- jzombie 3y agoNo. I just talk to it, like I am talking here, and if I don't get the answer I want, I tell it so.
- BlackjackCF 3y agoInteresting. Do you still find yourself using search at all to verify answers? I’ve found it useful for getting the general gist of something, but anything that requires something beyond the surface - I always end up having to verify because it’s usually wrong.
- gdsdfe 3y agoMan I was hoping 2024 would look nicer for the job market but it looks like the trend is not stopping
- UncleOxidant 3y agoYeah, several layoff announcements here today.
- solardev 3y agoIt's nice that they at least waited until after the X-mas shopping season.
- UncleOxidant 3y agoI know a software developer that was laid off 2 weeks before Christmas. With only 2 weeks of severance pay (after being at the company for ~7 years).
- solardev 3y agoOuch :( That's rough, sorry to hear that...
- hipadev23 3y agoConfirms that rest and vest was a zero interest rate phenomenon.
- rvz 3y agoIndeed it was. The fact that many HNers here thought it would continue forever was quite hilarious.
- marban 3y agoDupe https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38947224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38947224
- sidcool 3y agoI always had a special place for Google in my heart, since 2008. And never thought they would lay people off. It's sad really, despite I never having worked with them. I feel pretty gloomy about tech career overall. Is it even worth continuing to learn fundamentals and stuff?
- danjac 3y agoHaving lived through a recession or two, this is probably the first time I'm seriously thinking about a change of career (to do what else, of course, is the question). There's lots of people here whistling in the dark, but honestly the past year has felt more like a sea change in the industry than a temporary downturn. We can blame AI hype or interest rate changes, but probably it's more people taking a serious look at tech for once (whether big corps like Google or little startups) and seeing how much is just not that profitable or ever likely to be. Lots of naked swimmers in the tech industry.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sidcool 3y agoI am hearing on LinkedIn another 10K laid off. Can't verify.
- tock 3y agoCompanies become very successful and grow large enough to hire MBAs as leadership and then die a slow death over a few decades.
- agnosticmantis 3y agoWhat are the severance packages like this time?
- evilfred 3y agoAfter hearing for years and years that Google hires for people first, and then assigns you a team, this is a big surprise! Somehow all the worst performers at Google ended up on the same teams and they had to fire them en masse? Or is Google just another tech company now?
- mgh2 3y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38770151 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38770151
- Doubtme 3y ago[dead]
- 1vuio0pswjnm7 3y agoGoogle is no longer on Glassdoor's best places to work list. Best Places to Work 2023: 1. Gainsight 2. Box 3. Bain & Company 4. McKinsey & Company 5. NVIDIA 6. MathWorks 7. Boston Consulting Group 8. Google 9. ServiceNow 10. In-N-Out Burger Best Places to Work 2024: 1. Bain & Company 2. NVIDIA 3. ServiceNow NOW 4. MathWorks 5. Procore Technologies 6. In-N-Out Burger 7. VMware VMW 8. Deltek 9. 2020 Companies 10. Fidelity Investments
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sokoloff 3y agoI predict that VMWare as a "best place to work" is not going to age well given the Broadcom takeout of VMWare.
- foogazi 3y agoWhat do we do with this info? Is In-N-Out hiring SWEs ?
- ulfw 3y agoNo but burger staff is harder to replace by AI than SWEs.
- foogazi 3y agoRespectfully disagree here
- greenyoda 3y agoA company with $1.823 billion in revenue[1] would have a sizable IT department and do a lot of forecasting, maybe even using machine learning. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-N-Out_Burger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-N-Out_Burger
- 3y ago
- hatenberg 3y agoLook. When your execs summarily execute the morale of the entire sales org to position investor narrative, you know the company is in deep shit. Gemini Pro (future) beats GPt4 (today) by single digit percent when you use COT 32x - aka spend insane amounts of money. It’s bullshit. The layoffs will continue until growth can be achieved. Which in AI is a long time away for them.
- yonisto 3y agoI admit that I never understood what was going on with Google's voice assistant. As a user for the past 4-5 years or so (mainly using smart home devices), it hasn't shown improvement in quality; at times, it even seems to regress. What were all those people doing day to day??? This is a serious question. I remember thinking the same thing about Twitter: Why do they have all those employees? And, with an 80% reduction in workforce, they are still operating. Yes, the new management is ruining the business side of things, but the service is still functional in the same way as it was 3 years ago.
- MrDresden 3y ago> Yes, the new management is ruining the business side of things, but the service is still functional in the same way as it was 3 years ago. Have you ever thought that perhaps the quality of the work done by the people that Musk let go might have anything to do with that? If the foundation is solid, then there is nothing saying that a skeleton crew couldn't keep the lights on for a while. Until such a time when some major incident happens. Then the remaining workforce might hit a wall with what they can accomplish (not due to lack skill necessarily but lack of support).
- yonisto 3y agoIt could be. But it doesn't add up. According to wikipedia [0] 2017 - 3,372 Employees ( by this time building the foundation for 7+ years) 2021 - 7,500+ Employees And the functionality remained the same. I never found a good explanation what doubling the number of employees actually did. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter,_Inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter,_Inc.
- sidcool 3y agoHow much of this is Sundar's fault?
- lern_too_spel 3y agoAll of it. Google's management is rotten all the way up and down the entire organization, but Sundar has now had several years to fix it. According to my sources, all he's done is remove any internal measurement of the problem, so now he just has the lagging indicator of the market.
- addandsubtract 3y agoC levels at fault? Good one.