Report: Tencent employees facing mass layoffs as latest lockdowns affect Chinese tech giants' earnings

Chinese tech companies have been conducting staff cuts, according to the latest reports. Tencent is one of the firms to lay off employees at several departments amid regulatory pressure and the impact of the latest lockdowns.

South China Morning Post reported the news on May 22, citing local media and sources familiar with the matter.

• Tencent is now laying off around 100 employees from its sports channels. Many other departments are also reportedly “slashing headcount.”
• The company’s cloud computing and video teams have suffered at least two rounds of layoffs since April.
• Another source told the post that “entire teams of more than 20 employees were laid off.”
• Earlier this month, Tencent reported no revenue growth for the first time in 18 years, with president Martin Lau Chi-ping previously saying that the company would streamline or exit some non-core businesses to control headcount.
• Tencent and Alibaba might lay off tens of thousands of jobs this year, Reuters reported in March. According to the Post, the job cuts will affect people at Tencent’s cloud and content departments.
• The layoffs are reportedly happening due to strict Covid measures affecting tech companies’ earnings.
• The regulatory uncertainty in the country is also another major factor, with a lot of firms dealing with numerous restrictions (including the ones applied to the games industry).