Music streaming platform Tidal has laid off more than 10 per cent of its workforce, or about 40 employees.
The majority of the company is owned by tech billionaire Jack Dorsey-led digital payments company Block.
Tidal’s layoffs are part of Block’s declared goal of limiting its entire employment count to 12,000. Block, formerly known as Square, had 12,428 full-time employees worldwide as of December 31, 2022, reports Variety.
The news was first reported by Bloomberg.
“We can confirm, as part of Block and its recent announcement to cap the number of employees at the company to focus on business growth, Tidal has carefully considered how to right-size our team to ensure we are able to continue to build and invest in critical areas of the business,” Sade Ayodele, head of global communications for Tidal, was quoted as saying.
“We do not take these decisions lightly, and we are sincerely grateful for the contributions of our impacted teammates,” she added.
As mentioned in the report, the latest cut includes “a portion of the curation team that builds playlists”.
Tidal was formed in 2015. In 2021, Dorsey’s Block acquired a majority stake in Tidal. Block owns 87.5 per cent of the equity in Tidal.
Earlier this week, music streaming giant Spotify announced to eliminate about 17 per cent of its workforce across the company as it looks to become “both productive and efficient”.
Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek cited slowing economic growth and increased capital costs as reasons for the layoffs, claiming that the company used lower-cost capital in 2020 and 2021 to invest heavily in the business.
Spotify employs about 8,800 people, and this job cut move will impact over 1,500 employees, according to TechCrunch.