Spotify to lay off 17% of staff, CEO Daniel Ek suggests

Workforce, 

About the very last two a long time, we’ve put considerable emphasis on making Spotify into a genuinely terrific and sustainable enterprise – 1 intended to attain our aim of staying the world’s leading audio company and one that will regularly travel profitability and progress into the potential. Though we have made deserving strides, as I’ve shared quite a few moments, we continue to have do the job to do. Economic development has slowed significantly and capital has grow to be extra pricey. Spotify is not an exception to these realities.

This delivers me to a conclusion that will indicate a significant phase modify for our enterprise. To align Spotify with our long term goals and make certain we are appropriate-sized for the issues in advance, I have built the complicated choice to decrease our overall headcount by close to 17% throughout the business. I understand this will affect a range of people today who have designed beneficial contributions. To be blunt, several wise, gifted and challenging-operating men and women will be departing us.

For all those leaving, we are a much better company for the reason that of your dedication and tricky function. Thank you for sharing your abilities with us. I hope you know that your contributions have impacted extra than 50 % a billion persons and hundreds of thousands of artists, creators, and authors all around the earth in profound strategies. 

I know that for quite a few, a reduction of this sizing will truly feel surprisingly massive provided the current constructive earnings report and our functionality. We debated creating lesser reductions through 2024 and 2025. Yet, contemplating the hole involving our money aim point out and our current operational prices, I decided that a sizeable action to rightsize our expenses was the greatest alternative to complete our objectives. Even though I am persuaded this is the ideal motion for our business, I also realize it will be amazingly unpleasant for our group. 

To realize this choice, I think it is important to evaluate Spotify with a crystal clear, objective lens. In 2020 and 2021, we took edge of the chance presented by lessen-price tag capital and invested considerably in team expansion, written content enhancement, marketing and advertising, and new verticals. These investments usually worked, contributing to Spotify’s improved output and the platform’s strong progress this previous 12 months. Having said that, we now obtain ourselves in a really diverse ecosystem. And despite our attempts to cut down prices this previous calendar year, our expense composition for in which we need to be is nonetheless also major.

When we glance back on 2022 and 2023, it has actually been impressive what we have accomplished. But, at the identical time, the fact is a lot of this output was linked to possessing more resources. By most metrics, we had been more productive but considerably less effective. We want to be equally. Though we have done some do the job to mitigate this challenge and come to be a lot more economical in 2023, we nevertheless have a techniques to go ahead of we are equally successful and economical. These days, we however have way too many people focused to supporting get the job done and even performing get the job done about the do the job alternatively than contributing to prospects with true impact. A lot more individuals will need to be centered on offering for our critical stakeholders – creators and shoppers. In two text, we have to become relentlessly resourceful.

I know you will all be anxious to hear the subsequent techniques about how this method will operate. If you are an impacted staff, you will get a calendar invite in just the upcoming two hours from HR for a one-on-1 discussion. These conferences will acquire spot before the end of the day on Tuesday, and while Katarina will supply additional element on all of the particulars, please know the pursuing will implement to all of these bandmates:

• Severance fork out: We will get started with a baseline for all staff members, with the ordinary staff receiving around five months of severance. This will be calculated centered on regional observe period of time specifications and staff tenure.
• PTO: All accrued and unused getaway will be paid out to any departing personnel.
• Healthcare: We will carry on to go over health care for staff members through their severance period of time. 
• Immigration guidance: For employees whose immigration position is linked with their employment, HRBPs are doing the job with just about every impacted specific in concert with our mobility staff. 
• Career Assist:  All personnel will be suitable for outplacement companies for two months.

For the workforce that will continue to be at Spotify, I know this choice will be challenging for several. You should know we are targeted on dealing with our impacted colleagues with the respect and compassion they ought to have.

Hunting Ahead

The determination to cut down our team dimensions is a challenging but vital action toward forging a more robust, a lot more efficient Spotify for the upcoming. But it also highlights that we want to adjust how we operate. In Spotify’s early days, our results was challenging gained. We experienced limited assets and had to make the most of each and every asset. Our ingenuity and creativeness were being what set us apart. As we have grown, we have moved way too far absent from this main basic principle of resourcefulness. 

The Spotify of tomorrow have to be described by being relentlessly resourceful in the methods we operate, innovate, and deal with challenges. This variety of resourcefulness transcends the essential definition – it really is about making ready for our following section, in which getting lean is not just an selection but a requirement.

Embracing this leaner framework will also enable us to make investments our earnings extra strategically back again into the business. With a a lot more targeted technique, every expense and initiative results in being more impactful, providing higher prospects for achievement. This is not a phase again it is a strategic reorientation. We’re however fully commited to investing and building bold bets, but now, with a additional focused strategy, making certain Spotify’s continued profitability and skill to innovate. Lean will not signify modest ambitions it usually means smarter, extra impactful paths to accomplish them. 

Now is a tough but essential day for the business. To be very apparent, my commitment to our mission and belief in our means to achieve it has by no means been stronger. I hope you will join me on Wednesday for Unplugged to talk about how we transfer forward collectively. A reduction of this sizing will make it needed to alter the way we perform, and we will share a great deal additional about what this will mean in the times and months forward. Just as 2023 marked a new chapter for us, so will 2024 as we develop an even more powerful Spotify. 

– Daniel