WDC
2023 53,000 -18% from 2022; or -5% each year
2022 65,000
2012 103,111
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/WDC/western-digital/number-of-employees
Our friends at Seagate same story, but not as bad.
2023 33,400 -16% or -4% each year
2022 40,000
2012 57,900
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/STX/seagate-technology-holdings/number-of-employees
looks like there could be more to go on both sides
@3ped+1 probably could have achieved 1% eSSD share with the old JV, Sandisk simply filled the growing client segment transition Year each execs roll out Playbooks, do they ever post FY share the results they forecasted or just silent?
In WD even though HDD is more profitable Flash employees on average on the same level earn more. That’s a fact if you compare salaries of similar level people with same level of experience
@2ena+1oC9bZDY
Yes, HDD was marginally more profitable, but with 4X the number of employees
Flash is negative GM%. We promised investors 16% eSSD market share and today it is 1%. You can't blame that on anyone but ourselves. See definition of "hubris".
https://blocksandfiles.com/2023/09/14/european-server-and-storage-sales-through-the-channel-plummet/
If the drive capacity are increasing faster then the demand. That is shrinkage. Less drives to achieve the same effect.
@2ena+1oC9bZDY
While capacity/unit increases, they can't keep up with the usage demand increases. In other words, storage market will never shrink unless the world decides not to use computers anymore. The industry is consolidating for sure.
Not sure why anyone would be surprised from the NAND side. NAND makes more revenue, but is less profitable. HDD floated NAND for multiple years often times 60% or more of company profit. The NAND competition will only pick up and reading some of the reports in Europe, the storage market is shrinking. No road to recovery.
Doing R&D and producing 1,000,000s units a year is different than hosting a webpage.
Sadly you're probably in sinc with WD's executives. Let the layoffs, property sales, and executive bonuses continue...
I propose WD to get rid of 85-90% of employees like Musk did when he took over twitter. Twitter is still running and actually making profit.
both companies may still have too many employees if a data center businesses model is underpinning cost structures
2024 = ?
the word downturn implies that things go up again
Probably the CEO believes it himself as he is busy playing golf and counting his income and setting his goals how to spend
WD's CEO compensation tripled over the same period: $11M/yr in 2019 to $32M/yr in 2022. Lack of ethics at the top has consiquences.
vlx+1oC9bZDY
"We are not bloated. We are just clueless into how to use our resources effectively."
Sir, that's exactly what bloated means...
Lots of HDD manufacturing ops people in that number.
@vlx hasty decisions and course correction is SOP
So there are still over 50,000 in payroll right now? And somehow the leadership decided they do not have the funds to sustain the NAND STM engineers for a few more months. SMH
We are not bloated. We are just clueless into how to use our resources effectively. I blame management for blind execution. Looks like we got Stevie Wonder at the helm.
The most obvious indicator that WD was/is bloated is the fact that we're in constant perpetual firefighting mode. Instead of spending time to get things right to begin with, we tend to use process to catch inefficiencies.
There are many other signs/examples, but that's basically the essence.
bloated companies who slowly reacted and it caught up to them Seems both the lack vision to explore new markets or leverage their talent beyond their core business
From 103,111 to 53,000 employees in the span of 11 years wow!! Crazy when you think we are not showing growth as a company for soo many years. No wonder Wall Street do not like us. Instead of showing innovation we cut employees to try to get to parity with our earnings. Sad