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Spotify is laying off 17 percent of its employees in an attempt to cut costs, its CEO Daniel Ek announced to staff today<\/a>. Based on its total headcount of 9,241 revealed during its last earnings release, the cuts are expected to impact over 1,500 people.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n In a memo sent to staff, Ek said slowing economic growth and rising costs were to blame for the cuts, which he said would make Spotify a leaner company. \u201cToday, we still have too many people dedicated to supporting work and even doing work around the work rather than contributing to opportunities with real impact,\u201d Ek wrote. \u201cAs we\u2019ve grown, we\u2019ve moved too far away from this core principle of resourcefulness,\u201d he later added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cAs we\u2019ve grown, we\u2019ve moved too far away from this core principle of resourcefulness\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n These layoffs have come after Spotify\u2019s headcount increased significantly during the pandemic, with its headcount nearly doubling in the past three years, The Wall Street Journal<\/em> notes<\/a>. In his memo, Ek defended his decision to grow the team throughout that period, but said that \u201cwe now find ourselves in a very different environment.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Employees impacted by Spotify\u2019s latest layoffs will receive around five months of severance pay according to Ek\u2019s memo, during which time the company will continue to cover their healthcare.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Spotify has generally prioritized growth over quarterly profits throughout its history, but the WSJ <\/em>notes that investors have been increasingly pushing for profitability over the past year. Ek said at an investor day last year that he intends for Spotify to be profitable by 2024. Although the company posted a quarterly profit in its last earnings release<\/a>, the WSJ <\/em>notes that it reported losses of \u20ac462 million (around $502 million) in the first nine months of this year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n