[Info-vax] VSI employee retirements

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 1/23/2023 7:34 AM, Neil Rieck wrote:
> On Sunday, January 22, 2023 at 8:47:09 PM UTC-5, David Turner wrote:
>> I heard from an old friend and Dealer in the VSI neighborhood that
>> a few more got their pink slips a few weeks ago. This has got to be
>> unnerving for the employees
>> 
>> Does anyone have any real idea of what's going on there?
> 
> Not sure what is specifically happening at VSI but the number of
> layoffs in the whole tech sector are unnerving. Some claim it hasn't
> been this bad since the sub-prime mortgage scandal (2008) while
> others reference the dot-com crash (2001).

There has been significant layoffs, but it is my impression
that it has been mostly in some specific areas not across the board.

Most industries are not laying off but actually still hiring
(JP Morgan and American Express are examples of companies
actually hiring more IT people).

Everybody is nervous about the risk for a recession. Because
there has been so much talk about it. But it has not really
shown up yet. And if inflation keeps dropping and central
banks stop hiking interest rates then it may never come (for now).
But many are worried. What if inflation starts going up again.
What if the war in Ukraine escalate. What if China attacks
Taiwan. What if the house in the US won't raise the debt ceiling
and US federal defaults.

But some specific areas has been hit hard. I see at least 3 areas
having had to layoff a lot of people including IT people:

A) Startups without a solid business model especially
    in crypto and other fintech. When interest rates
    went up then their VC funding dried up and they are
    toast.

B) Companies or parts of companies with specific problems.
    Mortgage divisions in banks has been down-sizing because
    number of mortgages are dropping due to high interest rates.
    M&A divisions in banks and capital funds has been down-sizing because
    number of deals are dropping due to high interest rates.
    Facebook has problems because the Metaverse is not catching on.
    Twitter has problems because of lack of relevance (everybody
    talks about Elon Musk, but Twitter would have had massive
    layoffs also without Musk - Musk buying Twitter just cause
    it to be done "the Musk way").

C) Companies that has been on a non-stop hiring spree
    the last 5-10 years. Amazon, Google, Microsoft etc..
    Their business has not plunged into a hole, but growth
    has slowed/stopped. And they need to stop hiring. And
    they realize that during the hiring frenzy they may have
    hired too many, hired the wrong skill sets, hired at the wrong
    geographical locations, hired at too high compensation
    level etc.. So they make cuts to adjust.

Arne