Glovo will fire 250 workers. 6.5% of its workforce. This has been announced by Óscar Pierre, CEO and co-founder of the Spanish company. These cuts will mainly affect its workers at the Barcelona headquarters, although the layoffs cover 25 different countries.
As explained from Glovo, these layoffs were not part of their plans six months ago. Among the most affected areas are business support, recruitment and data, while “deliverers, collectors and front-line employees will not be affected.”
“Since we started in 2015, Glovo has experienced triple or double annual growth. When you grow so fast, there is a need to scale the team as quickly as possible to cope with the situation,” says Pierre. The situation in this 2023 has changed compared to previous years, with layoffs that are affecting practically all the big technology companies, with few exceptions.
The rise of Glovo was promoted in part by the pandemic itself. During each of the first three quarters of 2022, Glovo explains that it exceeded its gross revenue growth targets. But “demand is slowing down in the delivery sector.”
In addition to the economic situation, Glovo has the added financial pressure of various fines by the Labor Inspectorate. In total, a total of about 205.3 million euros is claimed from them for sanctions related to the use of false self-employed persons.
The startup expected gross losses of around 330 million euros by 2022. These numbers have not been to the liking of Delivery Hero, which bought the company early last year in an operation valued at around 2.3 billion euros at the time. A ruinous sale that does not finish balancing the accounts and that this 2023 begins with layoffs.
Along with Glovo, there have also been announcements of layoffs in Spanish startups such as Typeform, which announced a 10% cut in the workforce. Glovo is a new case of significant downsizing in a Spanish technology company. Unfortunately, given what is happening globally, it will surely not be the last.
Imagen | Angel Ganev
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