A number of employees working on Meta's data center infrastructure have been let go, as part of wider layoffs impacting five percent of the company.
Meta said that the cross-departmental cuts were for 'low performing' staff, but many of those let go said that they had received positive reviews from their managers.
On the data center side, employees affected include those at relatively high levels of seniority, some of whom have worked at the company for more than a decade.
"Today marks the end of an era for me," one former mechanical subject matter expert at Meta's Prineville, Oregon, data center said on LinkedIn, who had worked for the company for more than 14 years.
"Laid off from Meta today," the onsite design lead for Meta's upcoming $10 billion, four million sq ft, 2GW Louisiana data center campus said.
The company is currently hiring for other data center roles, as well as increasing the number of machine learning engineers.
The layoffs have been criticized for being unclear about why certain workers have been targeted, with many pointing to positive performance reviews. Others noted that layoffs will impact visa holders more - green card applications may need to be restarted, while L-1 visa holders will only be allowed to stay in the US if they can find a role at the same company.
Meta laid off 11,000 employees in 2022, 10,000 in 2023, and an undisclosed number in 2024. Its data center developments have historically been mostly immune to the cuts.
