Uber lays off 200 employees in recruitment division to cut costs

San Francisco, June 22

Ride-hailing major Uber is laying off 200 employees within its recruitment division as another measure to streamline costs.

The latest job cuts target 35 per cent of Uber's recruiting team, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

The company slashed 150 jobs in its freight services division earlier this year.

In May, the company announced it would maintain a flat workforce. Uber has expressed confidence in achieving operating income profitability by the end of 2023.

The company has reduced its workforce by at least 17 per cent since the pandemic began.

In 2020, Uber laid off around 6,700 jobs in two big job cut rounds.

After it laid off 3,500 of its workforce via a Zoom call, the ride-sharing firm in May 2020 announced it was cutting 3,000 more jobs in its second round of layoffs.

In the first quarter this year, the ride-hailing major Uber reported a 24 per cent increase in trips to 2.1 billion, or approximately 24 million trips per day on average.

According to Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, the company significantly accelerated Q1 trip growth to 24 per cent from 19 per cent last quarter, with "mobility trip growth of 32 per cent as a result of improved earnings and consumer engagement".

"Looking ahead, we are focused on extending our product, scale and platform advantages to sustain market-leading top and bottom-line growth beyond 2023," he said during the company's quarterly earnings call.

For Q2 2023, Uber anticipates gross bookings of $33 billion to $34 billion and adjusted EBITDA of $800 million to $850 million.