Cisco, among the Triangle’s largest employers, is laying off more employees. What we know

For the second time in two years, the tech conglomerate Cisco will cut around 5% of its total workforce, impacting several thousand employees.

“We are realigning our investments and expenses to reflect the current environment to help maximize long-term value for our shareholders,” Cisco chief financial officer Scott Herren said during an investors call Wednesday.

Since the 1990s, Cisco has been a major employer in Research Triangle Park. According to the state Department of Commerce, it has the fourth-biggest workforce in Durham County.

As of September 2022, the company employed 7,500 workers locally, but soon after, it announced global cuts affecting around 4,000 employees. Some Triangle-area staff were affected in these layoffs, an impacted employee told The New & Observer at the time.

The company did not share whether the latest cuts will hit the Triangle, nor did it provide its current local headcount. It is the latest big tech company to announce layoffs in 2024, joining Amazon, Google, and Microsoft.

In an email, Cisco spokesperson Robyn Blum said restructuring this year was necessary due to higher product inventories, a weak service provider market, and “the cautious macro environment.”

Impacted workers will be given competitive severance packages,” she said.

Cisco executives this week said the company will continue to invest in artificial intelligence hardware and software. CEO Chuck Robbins highlighted an AI infrastructure partnership with the chipmaker Nvidia.

“While there is tremendous opportunity ahead, we are still in the early stages of adoption of AI workloads,” he told investors.

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