Alibaba Group and Tencent Holdings will slash tens of thousands of jobs this year in the wake of China’s regulatory crackdown, Reuters news report said.
Alibaba is yet to specify a group-wide target for the layoffs.
Tencent, China’s biggest e-commerce company, could axe more than 15 percent of its total workforce, or about 39,000 staff.
Tencent, the owner of China’s dominant messaging app WeChat, plans to make employees redundant this year in some of its business units. Its unit overseeing businesses including video streaming and search will see a 10 percent-15 percent headcount cut this year.
Alibaba started to fire employees last month. Alibaba discussed job cuts with several business units last month and left it to them to make specific plans.
Alibaba’s local consumer services segment, which includes food delivery business Ele.me and other groceries delivery and mapping services, aims to lay off up to 25 percent of its employees.
Alibaba’s video streaming unit Youku is planning layoffs. That includes the planned dismissal of a team responsible for producing shows for kids.
Alibaba reported in February its slowest quarterly revenue growth since going public in 2014, hit by a fall in sales at its core business segment and intensifying competition.
Tencent will start layoffs at its less profitable or loss-making businesses such as Tencent Video and Tencent Cloud.
Tencent had 94,182 employees as of June last year compared with 70,756 a year earlier, according to its 2021 interim report.
China’s biggest ride-hailing firm Didi Global is also planning to reduce its overall headcount by as much as 15 percent as its domestic business has been impacted by the crackdown.
