Samuel Axon
Apple will cut 100 jobs, all in its digital services teams. Laid-off employees will have 60 days to find a new job with the company before the company ends working with them altogether, according to a Bloomberg report.
Compared to other major technology companies, layoffs at Apple are relatively rare. This is the fourth wave this year, but the cuts so far (including this one) have been targeted and small in scale – a contrast to companies like Intel, Cisco or Microsoft, which have recently made more drastic cuts of 7 to 15 percent of their workforce.
The current cuts primarily affect the Books team. Digital services like these have been a big part of Apple's financial success in recent quarters; last year alone, service revenues grew 14 percent. However, Books does not offer a subscription, and Apple was the subject of a U.S. Department of Justice lawsuit for price fixing.
As a result, the Books service is unable to deliver the high revenue and growth that Apple is aiming for. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman writes that Apple plans to reduce its focus on Books in the future, but still has plans to add new features to the service over time.
There were also cuts in the news team, but the focus there is not expected to decrease. It's also worth noting that some of these employees worked across teams, so these layoffs could have a small impact in other groups as well.