The entire division was laid off today.
25 replies (most recent on top)
Seriously though, RetailCPG has been bs’ing for years. The only thing they had in years was ULTA 🥱
Guess it depends on how you measure “well”. SAS tends to measure it by getting in someone’s Magic quadrant. If you ever look at the people below SAS, they are the ones making money. Funny how that is.
Who are the references? Town of Cary for flood prevention? Sure. I think there is a rail car example. What else? I’m sure there are more but a quick google search didn’t turn up much. I’m looking for true production implementations. Not partnerships.
The real measure of success is revenue. Getting true revenue numbers on a particular product has always been problematic and has been discussed elsewhere.
IOT is a very broad and BIG market. Go out and look at lists of companies playing heavily in the market and it will look something like
• General Electronics
• Microsoft Corporation
• Amazon Web Services
• International Business Machine (IBM) Corporation
• Google Inc.
• Cisco Systems Inc.
• Hewlett Packard Enterprise
• SAP SE
• Bosch Software Innovation GmBH
• Intel Corporation
• PTC Inc.
• Oracle Corporation
You won’t find SAS and never will. SAS is a bit player in every solutions space and that includes risk and fraud. They want to be everything to everyone using the same dead horses as leaders that have never been successful in anything.
IOT is just a rinse and repeat of JM and some of his old crew from decades past. If SAS was serious, they aren’t, they would hire from the outside and build the business. Not the SAS way.
When the purchase or IPO comes, this will get dropped like a hot rock.
I thought the IOT group was doing reasonably well with some of the Industry 4.0 initiatives. Is that not the case?
The industrial segment (especially manufacturing) is investing heavily in automation, digital twins, CHIPS act, computer vision, operational optimization, etc that seems to be propelling IOT engagement, but I could be wrong.
Post from TheLayoff.com
Doesn’t apply here. Don’t think it was even close to the minimum required for reporting to the state. Also assuming that applies to 500 NC employees so again it wouldn’t apply. There were global people, too. I think a more interesting question and more complex for SAS is what sort of separation agreements are required in each country.
"Businesses... are required to file a WARN notice if they... close a plant [or] conduct a mass layoff of at least 500 employees."
https://www.commerce.nc.gov/business/business-closure-resources/file-warn-notice
Hahahaha. Karma’s a bi--h. Good luck!
Any reason there wouldn’t be a WARN notice?
https://www.commerce.nc.gov/data-tools-reports/labor-market-data-tools/workforce-warn-reports/report-workforce-warn-listings-2024/open
"Yesterday an exec email came out saying the bonus pool would be bigger, there was growth in core business, there was profit but missed growth target and profit margin target of 10%."
Could it be that the bonus pool is bigger simply because they just got rid of a lot of people so less people to pay out for bonus so the remainders get a bigger slice of bonus?
Everyone under, and including, RW were eliminated. A handful were shifted to a support role to keep lights on.
In the News and Observer, SAS confirms this layoff but does not provide details.
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article286319080.html
Latest SAS reorganization cuts jobs within Cary software company’s retail solutions
BY BRIAN GORDON UPDATED MARCH 06, 2024 9:53 AM
SAS Institute has confirmed workers in the company’s retail solutions division lost their jobs following the latest organizational shift at the prominent Cary analytic software provider.
This week’s action follows moves last year that SAS said reduced its total workforce by around 1%.
“Evolving our organizational structure and aligning the right talent to our core focus areas is part of our normal business process and remains a priority for SAS,” company spokesperson Shannon Heath said in an email Wednesday.
Heath did not share how many positions were affected.
Several anonymous posts published Tuesday on the online forum TheLayoff.com referenced job losses, including within SAS’ retail solutions. In the past few years, SAS has slimmed its headcount with layoffs in 2021 and subsequent voluntary buyouts.
“Over the years through natural attrition and conservative hiring, our headcount has gone down incrementally,” Heath told The News & Observer in January 2023.
These staffing decisions come as SAS eyes going public, with an aim of reaching the stock market in 2025.
According to Forbes, SAS is among the 200 largest private companies in the United States, by revenue, and its cofounder and CEO Jim Goodnight is the wealthiest person in the state.
Data from the North Carolina Department of Commerce ranks SAS as Wake County’s fifth biggest private employer.
When you say an entire “division” was dissolved, is that just within R&D?
What happens to customers that have those products ? Is R&D and support just phased out for them?
IOT has been limping along for way too long under the highly paid husband of a C-team female. another incredible waste of money and headcount. limping limping limping. think of how many worker bees could be brought on for the ungodly amount of money that one person is paid. his monthly paycheck is the same as some new employees make in a whole year. it turns my stomach.
Yep. The sales teams were told to sell VIYA to customers that already had SAS solutions that solved their business problems with no real replacement for what they had that worked for them. And great news! It will cost more! What a winning strategy.
I was around when SAS bought Marketmax. SAS has rarely done a good job with acquisitions and this was no exception. Took a long time to die and it wasn’t COVID that ki-led it. Maybe the final nail in the coffin. Decisions made long before put it in life support.
If I were IOT, I’d be looking over my shoulder. Same for healthcare and any solution not in fraud or Risk.
"the death knell was trying to force-fit AI and Viya into an industry that only cares about industry-specific everything."
THAT!
That is not just the down fall of Retail. That is a significant contributing factor to the decline of SAS in general.
Retail has been dragging along well before the pandemic. A few projects were dropped and others were only kept on for existing customers. Like another comment mentioned size optimization, demand planning and merchandise planning never worked out well.
Did BH blame it on their lack of up-skilling?
That was my understanding.
when you say the whole division was laid off, who exactly? everyone under RW?
there are some specific solutions like size optimization, demand planning and merchandise planning. very niche for retail. but in recent years they'd been push less of those specialized ones and had been getting pressure to push broader things like forecasting and ci360 for marketing. the death knell was trying to force-fit AI and Viya into an industry that only cares about industry-specific everything. with retail being reduced in priority as an industry, everyone in the business unit should have seen this coming along time ago. the revenue in this area has been dismal for years, it never recovered after Covid.
What products are in the retail division and what happens to them?
retail has not been bringing in any revenue since the pandemic. huge drain financially. retailers don't have the money to pay what sas is asking. i'm surprised it didn't happen before now.
"With this reorganization, some Retail division roles will no longer be required."
I wonder if the people getting laid off are getting bonuses ....
I’d be shocked if it was that many. Maybe if you count R&D in India.
Yesterday an exec email came out saying the bonus pool would be bigger, there was growth in core business, there was profit but missed growth target and profit margin target of 10%.
It’s not clear yet exactly what all this means and what happens to the existing customers.
Does anyone know how many people that represents? I was told 100 but my best rough count returned about 180.