LinkedIn, Cisco and Amazon are the latest tech companies laying off more workers

Job cuts are hitting the tech sector as companies increase investments in artificial intelligence.

This week, San Jose-based technology company Cisco announced it would cut fewer than 4,000 jobs, or less than 5 percent of its workforce. Cisco announced the layoffs the same day the company said it increased revenue to $15.8 billion and net income to $3.4 billion for the third quarter ending in April.

Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins said in an email to employees that he is “confident” the company will “win in the AI ​​era” but that doing so requires “focus, urgency and discipline to continually redirect investments to areas of greatest demand and long-term value creation.”

“That means making tough decisions — about where we invest, how we are organized, and how our cost structure reflects the opportunity before us,” he told employees in the email posted on Cisco’s website.

Cisco provides products and services in areas such as networking, cybersecurity and remote working.

Microsoft-owned LinkedIn, a professional social network that people use to apply for jobs, is also laying off workers.

Reuters, citing two people familiar with the matter, reported Wednesday that LinkedIn was laying off 5% of its staff, or about 875 people.

“As part of our regular business planning, we have implemented organizational changes to best position ourselves for future success,” a LinkedIn spokesperson said in a statement.

In a memo published on Business Insider, LinkedIn CEO Daniel Shapero told employees that the cuts would impact the global sales organization, marketing and engineering teams. The company, he said, is also focused on operating “more profitably.”

“We must reinvent the way we work, with agile teams focused on our highest priorities, and redirecting investments to areas such as infrastructure to fulfill our mission and long-term vision. This requires difficult prioritization and trade-offs,” he said in the memo.

Amazon, which announced in January it was cutting 16,000 jobs, is also making cuts to its trading partner services team. The company did not say how many people had been laid off.

“We regularly review our organizations to ensure we are best prepared to achieve our goals. Following a recent review, we have made the difficult decision to eliminate a relatively small number of positions in our Selling Partner Services team. We do not make such decisions lightly and are committed to supporting impacted employees with transitional healthcare, severance, and outsourced job placement services,” an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement.

The cuts come as other big tech companies, including Meta, Block, Oracle and others, lay off thousands of workers this year.

Cloudflare and cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase also recently announced job cuts. Cloudflare’s job cuts included laying off 224 people at its San Francisco headquarters, according to a notice to the California Employment Development Department.

Some tech companies, which also sell AI-based products, say workers can accomplish more with fewer people by using AI to generate code and complete tasks. Others talked about restructuring and cost cutting to offset the billions of dollars spent on AI infrastructure.