FireEye – a leading cybersecurity firm – has announced the planned layoff of 300-400 members of its 3,400 member workforce owing to falling demand for their services. Shares in the firm fell 16.2 percent on the announcement.
The team at FireEye isn’t the only thing taking a cut – the California-based firm also adjusted its full year sales outlook downward and cut its full-year revenue forecast to $716 million-$728 million from $780 million-$810 million.
According to FireEye CFO Michael Berry, the cuts come as FireEye is moving to restructure and streamline its operations. The net saving expected from the new efficiency efforts is $80 million. CEO Kevin Mandia said the firm has been seeing a change in criminal attack patterns of late – with financially driven criminals leveraging tools such as ransomware. Ransomware is reportedly relatively simple to clean up.
“The size and scope have changed. The whole remediation was more complex,” Mandia noted – comparing the common hacks of today with the larger state-backed efforts the firms was dealing with out of China in recent memory.
FireEye reported Q2 revenue of $175 million – below its in-house projections of $178 million to $185 million.
FireEye was one of a few firms to report that cyber espionage attacks from China have dropped off this year as well – indicating the Chinese government is making good on a 2015 agreement to stop corporate espionage hacking.
As of the close of market yesterday – FireEye shares had fallen more than 62 percent in the last 12 months.
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