# VC10X Pulse - The Reason Behind 100,000 Layoffs in 2025

An episode of [VC10X - Investing, Venture Capital, Asset Management, Family Office, Wealth Management](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1632806986), 6 Nov 2025, 6:14.

Audio: https://anchor.fm/s/a453ddd4/podcast/play/110784312/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2025-10-6%2F410721644-44100-2-73e5146da28b9.mp3

Meta and Amazon are making billions in profit, so why are they laying off thousands of employees in late 2025? It’s not a recession, it’s a strategic shift. We break down the real reasons behind the new wave of "quiet layoffs" sweeping Big Tech and what it means for the future of your career. In this deep dive, you'll learn about the "Great AI Re-Allocation," how the "Year of Efficiency" became a permanent strategy, and why the jobs of the future are becoming highly specialized. This isn't just news; it's a critical look at the new rules of the tech industry and how you can navigate them. TIMESTAMPS (00:00) - Introduction: Meta and Amazon layoffs despite record profits (00:37) - Recent layoff reports at Meta and Amazon (01:35) - The new normal: continuous strategic culling in big tech (02:00) - Reason 1: The great AI reallocation (02:50) - Reason 2: Year of efficiency as permanent operating philosophy (03:40) - Reason 3: Pandemic hiring aftershocks (04:17) - What does this mean for you? (05:04) - Silver lining: Talent boost for startup ecosystem (05:22) - Conclusion and call to action KEY TAKEAWAYS ✅ Why profitable companies are still cutting staff. ✅ How AI is forcing a massive reallocation of talent and capital. ✅ The new skills that are in high demand (and which are at risk). SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE VC & STARTUP STRATEGY VC10X breaks down the most important stories in tech, startups, and investing every week. If you want actionable insights to help you build or invest in the next great company, subscribe now. LET'S CONNECT Website: https://VC10X.com X / Twitter: https://x.com/choubeysahab LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/choubeysahab COMMENT BELOW Has this new wave of layoffs affected you or your company? Let's discuss it in the comments. #TechLayoffs #Meta #Amazon #BigTech #JobMarket #CareerAdvice #AI #VentureCapital

## Transcript

[0:00] Meta stock is soaring past all time highs, Amazon is posting
[0:04] record-breaking profits. So why are they both quietly
[0:07] laying off thousands of employees yet again?
[0:10] This isn't a repeat of the massive year of efficiency cuts
[0:14] from 2023. This is something different,
[0:17] something more calculated. The rules of the tech industry
[0:20] have changed, and the new wave of layoffs reveals a brutal
[0:24] reality for anyone building a career in tech.
[0:27] Today, we are breaking down the three real reasons this is
[0:30] happening and what it means for the future of your job.
[0:34] Let's get into it. All right, Let's first look at
[0:38] what's actually going on. Over the past few weeks, reports
[0:42] have surfaced about fresh downs of job cuts at both Meta and
[0:45] Amazon. At Meta, the layoffs are hitting
[0:48] specific divisions hard. We are seeing significant cuts
[0:51] in the Reality Labs unit, the part which was responsible for
[0:55] building the Meta world, as well as other experiments non AI
[0:58] projects. These aren't about saving money
[1:00] in a crisis. This is about a deliberate
[1:03] reallocation of resources. They're fighting in one area to
[1:07] aggressively hide in another. That is generative AI.
[1:11] Over at Amazon it's a similar story but with a different
[1:14] flavor. They're continuing a multi year
[1:16] effort to increase efficiency. The rules being eliminated are
[1:20] often incorporate and technology divisions that swelled during
[1:23] the massive hiring boom of the pandemic.
[1:26] They're calling it performance management and role redundancy.
[1:30] But the goal is clear. Increase the productivity and
[1:33] output of every single employee. This isn't just a Meta and
[1:37] Amazon problem. This is a new normal across big
[1:40] tech. The era of panic given mass
[1:42] layoffs is over. We are now in the age of
[1:45] continuous strategic goal and to understand why, you need to look
[1:49] at 3 powerful forces driving the shift.
[1:51] So if these companies are making so much money, why are they
[1:54] firing people? It comes down to this.
[1:57] First and most importantly is the great AIV allocation.
[2:01] The race for AI supremacy is the single most important battle in
[2:04] technology right now, and it's forcing companies to make
[2:07] ruthless decisions. Think about it from the CE OS
[2:10] perspective. Capital and talent are finite.
[2:13] Every dollar and every engineer you have working on a virtual
[2:16] reality headset is a resource you can't put towards building
[2:20] your own large language model. Mark Zuckerberg and Andy Jesse
[2:24] are under immense pressure from their boards and from the Wall
[2:27] Street to prove they have a winning AI strategy.
[2:31] This has created an AI mandate. It means prioritizing AI
[2:34] projects above everything else, even if it means killing of
[2:38] products and divisions that were once seen as the future.
[2:42] They're literally fighting people in one building to open
[2:44] up headcount and budget for AI talent in the building next
[2:48] door. The second reason is the year of
[2:51] efficiency never really ended. It just became the new operating
[2:56] philosophy. In 2023, Mark Zuckerberg's
[2:58] mantra was a response to a market crash.
[3:00] Today it's a long term strategy. The belief is Silicon Valley now
[3:04] is that leaner, flatter organizations are simply more
[3:08] effective. They move faster and innovate
[3:11] better. This means systematically
[3:12] removing the layers of middle management and project managers
[3:16] to put engineers and project builders closer to the decision
[3:19] makers. The era of growth at all cost is
[3:23] debt. High interest rates in shaky
[3:25] global economy mean investors now reward cold hard
[3:28] profitability and operational discipline far more than they
[3:31] reward speculative moon shots. Tech companies are now being run
[3:36] like mature, profitable businesses, not like scrappy
[3:39] startups with unlimited cash. And finally, we are still seeing
[3:43] the aftershocks of the pandemic. Between 2020 and 2022, companies
[3:47] like Amazon went on an unprecedented hiding spree,
[3:50] adding hundreds of thousands of employees to keep up with the
[3:53] surge in e-commerce and cloud computing.
[3:55] They hired for the world that they thought would exist
[3:57] forever. But that world is gone.
[4:00] The demand for digital services has stabilized at a new lower
[4:03] level than the peak of the pandemic.
[4:06] So these companies are still working to right size their
[4:08] organizations. The smaller ongoing cuts are the
[4:12] final echos of that massive once in a generation hiring boom.
[4:17] So what does this all mean for you and your credit in tech?
[4:20] It means we are living in a tale of two job markets.
[4:24] On one hand, if your job is directly related to artificial
[4:27] intelligence or machine learning, think AI researchers,
[4:30] ML engineers, data scientists with AI experience, you are in
[4:34] the golden age. Companies are fighting a war for
[4:37] your talent, salaries are soaring and you can practically
[4:39] name your price. But on the other hand, if your
[4:41] role is in a non core business unit and experimental blue sky
[4:45] project are in functions like project management or
[4:48] recruiting, your job security is lower than it has been in a
[4:51] decade. The bar to get into big tech is
[4:54] now finally higher, the interview loops are now more
[4:57] gruelling and the performance expectation from day one are
[5:00] intense. Rest and rest is a thing of the
[5:03] past, but there is a silver lining.
[5:05] The incredible talent being shed by Google, Meta and Amazon is a
[5:09] massive boon for the startup ecosystem.
[5:11] Founders can now hire world class experience engineers and
[5:15] managers who are completely unaffordable or unavailable.
[5:18] Just a few years ago, this could fuel the next wave of innovation
[5:21] outside the walls of big tech. So the tech job market isn't
[5:25] collapsing, it's transforming, and it's becoming highly
[5:28] specialized. The message from Silicon Valley
[5:31] is brutally clear. If your job is indirectly
[5:33] contributing to the AI driven bottom line, it's at risk of
[5:36] being reallocated. The jobs of the future and the
[5:39] job security of today belong to the builders, the innovators,
[5:42] and the AI specialist. The game has changed.
[5:46] If you want to stay ahead of these trends and understand
[5:48] where the words of tech and venture capital are headed next,
[5:51] make sure you hit that subscribe button.
[5:53] We release a new deep dive just like this every single week to
[5:56] give you the insights you need to navigate your career and your
[5:59] investments. And now I want to hear from you.
[6:01] Drop a comment and let us know. Have these recent layouts
[6:05] affected you or someone you know?
[6:07] Let's talk about it. Thanks for watching.
[6:10] See you next week. We see the next.

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