Mark Zuckerberg-led social media giant Meta has carried out a massive restructuring of the company by laying off 10% of its workforce globally and transferring 7,000 other employees to new initiatives related to AI workflows.
“Unfortunately, your role has been eliminated as part of today’s reorganisation. If you are already in the office, we ask that you please gather any personal items at your desk and head home. It’s always sad to say good-bye to people who have contributed to our mission and to building this company. I feel the weight of that,” read another email of his that landed in the inboxes of those who got affected by the layoffs on May 20.
After this, Zuckerberg immediately shot another memo to Meta’s employees, where he stated, “I want to be clear that we do not expect other company-wide layoffs this year. I also want to acknowledge that we haven’t been as clear as we aspire to be in our communication, and that’s one area I want to make sure we improve.”
As per him, the “changes” are part of a far-reaching overhaul that is happening at Meta in 2026, with the Facebook owner surging its AI investments in a bid to centre AI agents in both its product offerings and its internal operations.
While the layoffs have hit about 20% of the tech giant’s workforce, it has more or less followed the same pattern of “AI-linked job cuts” among major US companies this year, particularly in the tech sector. Meta has also closed an additional 6,000 open roles as part of the restructuring process.
The “transferred” Meta employees will now be working on initiatives including Applied AI Engineering (AAI) and Agent Transformation Accelerator (ATA) XFN, two teams previously announced by CTO Andrew Bosworth as part of Meta’s “AI for Work” efforts.
These two divisions have been tasked to develop AI agents that can autonomously carry out tasks currently performed by human staffers. Central Analytics, also a destination for transfer and mentioned in Bosworth’s announcement, will aim to measure productivity and analytics for agent development.
The latest layoffs mark Meta’s biggest company-wide cuts since Zuckerberg launched his 2022-23 “Year of Efficiency”, a period that saw the removal of around 21,000 jobs across the social media giant. Talking about Meta’s capital expenditure on the AI front, the venture has forecast capital expenditure between USD 125 billion and USD 145 billion in 2026, more than double its 2025 spending.
Meta’s severance package includes 16 weeks of base pay, along with two additional weeks for every year worked at Meta. The company would also cover health insurance premiums for employees and their dependents for up to 18 months.
The laid-off employees would continue receiving vested stock grants and paid time off dues. The social media giant also offered three months of external job-search assistance through Lee Hecht Harrison.