GitLab to reduce workforce by 7%

GitLab is the latest tech company to announce a round of layoffs, as the developer operations (DevOps) giant revealed today that it’s reducing its headcount by 7%.

It has been a tough 2023 so far for the technology industry, with most of the big tech companies announcing staff cutbacks, including Microsoft, Alphabet and Salesforce. Similar to all these companies, GitLab put its decision down to the economic climate, and specifically its customers reducing their own software spending.

“The current macroeconomic environment is tough, and as a result, companies are still spending but they are taking a more conservative approach to software investments and are taking more time to make purchasing decisions,” GitLab co-founder and CEO Sid Sijbrandij wrote in a letter to employee that it also published to its website.

GitLab went public on the Nasdaq some 16 months ago, and its shares haven’t performed too strongly in the intervening months. The remote-first company currently has a market cap of around $7 billion, substantially down on its $15 billion IPO day valuation and its $19 billion peak a few months later.

The company’s most recently reported headcount was 1,630, revealed in a 10-K report last year, meaning that the round of redundancies will impact around 114 people, though that specific figure is dependent on its actual headcount as of today.

“I had hoped reprioritizing our spending would be enough to withstand the growing global economic downturn,” Sijbrandij wrote. “Unfortunately, we need to take further steps and match our pace of spending with our commitment to responsible growth.”

In terms of severance, Sijbrandij said that all staff affected will receive pay through the “transition period,” plus a single payout equivalent to around four months base salary. He also said that staff will continue to receive healthcare for six months in locations where that is part of their package.