Google likely to let go 30,000 employees?

In yet another layoff, Search giant Google is likely to let go 30,000 employees as the company plans to implement Artificial Intelligence-based tools for creating and suggesting ads.

According to a report by The Information, the company is planning to reorganize a major portion of its 30,000-strong ad sales unit and align the work with the recent advances in AI. It is worth noting that around 12,000 employees were laid off by the earlier this year, making it the biggest job cut in the company’s history.

The jobs in the ad sales unit of Google are being made redundant because Google has introduced new AI-based tools that can create new ads that can result in customer satisfaction, even with little attention from the company employees.

Notably, Google launched its AI-powered campaign planner, Performance Max, in 2021, but the company decided to add generative AI-based capabilities to the ad tool at the Google I/O event earlier this year, making it easier to “create custom assets and scale them in a few clicks”.

The Information’s report also noted that the number of advertisers adopting Performance Max had increased, which has eliminated the need for employees specialising in selling ads for a particular Google service, such as YouTube, Search, Display, Discover, Gmail and Maps.

The decision to restructure the ad sales unit was announced internally by Google’s president of the Americas and Global Partners, Sean Downey, at a meeting last week. However, Downey did not make any statement if the reorganisation would lead to another round of job cuts.