Dropbox Is Laying Off 500 Employees And Focusing On Artificial Intelligence

(CTN News) – It has been reported that Dropbox will lay off around 500 employees, which represents about 16 percent of its total workforce in the country.

Dropbox CEO Drew Houston in a memo to employees explains that the layoffs could be as a result of the rocky economy, but he also explains that the cuts will allow the company to grow its artificial intelligence division as a result.

Ideally, we would be able to simply shift people from one team to another in order to accomplish the goal. In fact, we have done this everywhere we have been able to,” Houston writes.

It is true that our next stage of growth will require a different mix of skills, particularly those in AI and early stages of product development, in order for the business to succeed.

It has been a pleasure bringing in great talent in these areas over the last couple of years, and we are expecting to need even more in the near future.”
In order to facilitate the transition, Houston says Dropbox will consolidate its core business and document workflow businesses and it is also making adjustments to the product development teams as part of the change.

According to Houston, Dropbox is still “profitable” despite the tough times in the economy, and the job cuts are part of a natural maturation of Dropbox as a business in the current economic climate.

While the changes we are announcing today will be painful for some, Houston notes that they are an essential part of our future.

My goal is to ensure that Dropbox is at the forefront of the AI era, just as Dropbox was at the forefront of the shift to mobile and the cloud when we were at the forefront of the mobile era.

As machine intelligence gives us the tools to reimagine our existing businesses and invent new ones, it is essential that we work together to reimagine our businesses and come up with new ones.”

As Houston has previously expressed interest in exploring artificial intelligence, a 2018 letter from him and co-founder Arash Ferdowsi stated that the use of “machine intelligence” will help Dropbox better understand and serve its customers in the future.

Over the years, the file hosting service has introduced some AI-powered features to its offerings, such as automatic text recognition, which it introduced in 2018, and some other AI-powered features as well.

It is evident, however, that Dropbox is serious about making a shift into the artificial intelligence arena if it is laying off employees just to replace them with ones who have experience in the field.

It is anticipated that affected employees will receive a minimum of 16 weeks of pay, up to six months of healthcare benefits, and the ability to keep their company devices for personal use.

Additionally, they will receive career counseling and assistance in finding employment.

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