Apple recently laid off around 100 employees from its services division, a rare move for the tech giant. The layoffs, which occurred on Tuesday, 27 August, mainly affected employees in senior vice president Eddy Cue’s services group.
The cuts were spread across several teams, with the most significant impact on the team responsible for the Apple Books app and Apple Bookstore. According to a report on Bloomberg, Apple decided to downsize these teams as it shifts its focus within the services division. While Apple Books will continue to receive updates and new features, it is no longer a priority for the company.
Despite these layoffs, Apple News remains a key focus, and the cuts in that team are not viewed as a sign of reduced importance.
Earlier in 2024, Apple laid off hundreds of employees as it shut down its self-driving car project and a microLED display project. Some employees from the special project group or SPG, out of the about 1,400 who were working on the project, were to be moved to Apple’s generative AI projects, as per the Bloomberg report.
The electric car project had not been publicised and was mostly kept under wraps. However, it had eaten up a lot of resources over the past ten years or so, which had begun to worry senior executives. Additionally, the leadership of the team as well as its strategies had undergone many changes over time.
The impacted employees, especially the hardware engineers and car designers were given three months to get themselves moved to other suitable roles within Apple failing which they were asked to leave the company.
Overall, this move reflects Apple’s ongoing strategy to concentrate on areas deemed most critical to its future growth, even if it means making tough decisions about its workforce.