Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has sacked over 11,000 employees.

The Chief Executive Officer of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, made this known via a message to the workers on Wednesday.

The layoffs will reduce the company’s workforce by about 13%.

Meta is the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.

“I want to take accountability for these decisions and for how we got here. I know this is tough for everyone, and I’m especially sorry to those impacted,” Zuckerberg told the employees.

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Zuckerberg said the development followed his decision to “significantly increase our investments” at the start of the pandemic.

He told employees he made that decision based on the belief that e-commerce would continue to grow and provide a strong source of revenue post-pandemic.

“Not only has online commerce returned to prior trends, but the macroeconomic downturn, increased competition, and ads signal loss have caused our revenue to be much lower than I’d expected. I got this wrong, and I take responsibility for that,” the Facebook CEO said.

Zuckerberg further stated that affected employees in the United States will receive 16 weeks of severance pay plus two additional weeks for every year they have been at the company, payment for their remaining paid time off, six months of health insurance, and immigration support for people on visas.

He said the support will be similar to those outside the U.S., adding that the company will “follow up soon with separate processes that take into account local employment laws.”

The Star