Apple CEO Tim Cook keeps layoff as 'last resort' in tough economic climate

Tim Cook

Apple doesn’t have any plans for big layoffs, CEO Tim Cook told CNBC while discussing the company’s earnings on May 4 in a stark contrast from Big Tech peers like Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft and Amazon, which have cut thousands of employees this year.

"I view that as a last resort and, so mass layoffs is not something that we’re talking about at this moment," he said. Apple is, however, cutting costs and has slowed down on its rate of hiring, he mentioned.

"We’re continuing to be extremely prudent on hiring. We’re continuing to hire, just at a lower clip level than we were before," Cook said. "And we’re doing all the right things of challenging the things that we spend, and we’re just finding a few more ways to save on it."

At the time when major rival companies were making significant job cuts in response to post-Covid turmoil and uncertain economic conditions, Apple was able to successfully mitigate layoffs through its measured approach to hiring and other cost-cutting measures during the pandemic. Reportedly, the company paused hiring, delayed bonuses, and had put major projects on hold.

The technology giant consciously stayed away from over-hiring at the time of pandemic which is one the prime reasons for mass layoffs. It stuck to conservative hiring between 2020 and 2022. These efforts seem to have worked for the company, which reported a total revenue of $95 billion for the March quarter.