Layoffs at the Berlin location – 4 percent affected

Layoffs at Delivery Hero: The start-up from Berlin has to lay off employees again just a few months after the last wave of layoffs. According to CEO Niklas Östberg, this time it affects four percent of the jobs – mainly in the Berlin company headquarters.

Delivery Hero is laying off 4 percent of its employees

It’s not even three months since Niklas Östberg had to announce layoffs at Delivery Hero. Now it’s that time again. Again mirror reports that the delivery service from Berlin is laying off a total of four percent of its employees.

The 156 redundancies primarily affect the company headquarters in Berlin. This is not about drivers, but again about functional areas. This time, unlike in November 2022, the layoffs will not affect the finance, legal and marketing departments.

Terminations at Delivery Hero should enable profitability

The (former) Berlin flagship start-up once again gave the tense financial situation as a reason. How from the last annual report shows that the delivery service is aiming for the first half of 2023 to take a step towards profitability.

Since it was founded in May 2011, CEO Niklas Östberg’s company has been struggling with the dilemma that many (technology) start-ups find themselves in: In order to enable high growth, high losses are accepted in the first few years.

It is crucial that the step into the profit zone succeeds as quickly as possible. Almost twelve years have already passed at the listed Berlin group. The current layoffs are said to be loud mirror enable “a leaner and more efficient organization”.

Even the last wave of layoffs was argued by a company spokeswoman with the desire to increase “operational efficiency”.

Severance pay for employees, layoffs at subsidiary in Spain

According to the internal note, Östberg offers its soon-to-be former employees “generous” severance payments and mental support in the difficult situation. The latter in particular seems inappropriate or at least hypocritical in view of the layoffs.

The argument as to why the renewed layoffs could not be communicated in November 2022 is also questionable. At that time, not all departmental analyzes had simply been carried out.

But not only at the headquarters in Berlin are there layoffs. The Spanish delivery service subsidiary Glovo will also save 250 jobs. It shows that compulsive growth – including among employees – is not necessarily the best way for (young) companies.

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