Patreon Shuts 2 EU Offices, Cuts 17% of Staff

Entertainment subscription site Patreon will be cutting around 17% of its staff and closing two offices in Europe, a Bloomberg report said.

This will affect 80 employees in operations and finance departments, along with others, according to a statement from CEO Jack Conte. And the closed offices will be in Dublin and Berlin.

Conte said the reason for this came down to “changes in the technology industry and the economy” in the last nine months.

“If you don’t receive such a calendar invitation within 10 minutes of my posting this message, your role is not impacted by today’s change,” Conte wrote.

Patreon has waived its usual one-year period for employee equity vesting for those who have been laid off. This will make it so “everyone has an opportunity to be a shareholder, regardless of your tenure.” Patreon has also recently laid off several security employees in what Conte said was a different matter than the current layoffs.

Patreon is privately-held and is dealing with a tightening venture capital market which has seen many companies laying off staff – including Shopify, Peloton, meditation app developer Calm and others.

Over 600 tech companies have announced staff cuts publicly. More than 78,000 employees have been affected, per data from Layoffs.fyi, which looks at job cuts.

PYMNTS wrote that Bed Bath & Beyond was another company that laid off employees recently in a bid to boost profitability.

Read more: Bed Bath & Beyond: Layoffs, Closures Coming to Boost Profitability

The home goods retailers laid off 20% of its workforce and also closed over 150 stores.

The company announced this in late August, saying it had secured commitments for more than $500 million in new financing.

“We have taken a thorough look at our business, and today, we are announcing immediate actions aimed to increase customer engagement, drive traffic, and recapture market share,” Sue Gove, the retailer’s interim CEO, said in a news release. “This includes changing our merchandising and inventory strategy, which will be rooted in national brands. Additionally, we are focused on driving digital and foot traffic, as well as optimizing our store fleet.”