Tech companies slash hundreds of Bay Area jobs, hiring slump persists

Tech companies have slashed well over 400 Bay Area jobs in fresh rounds of employment cutbacks that offer an ominous warning that the industry’s downsizing has yet to run its course.

All told, three tech companies have disclosed plans to chop an estimated 419 jobs in the Bay Area, according to official WARN letters the firms sent to the state Employment Development Department.

LinkedIn, Chegg and Hewlett Packard Enterprise have disclosed their intentions to reduce staffing in the Bay Area, the WARN notices show.

Here are some of the details of the recent disclosures of layoff plans by the tech companies:

— LinkedIn, 270 job cuts, affecting workers in Mountain View, Sunnyvale and San Francisco. Of these, 159 job cuts were planned for Mountain View. The layoffs occurred on May 15, the career-oriented social network stated.

— Chegg, 88 layoffs in Santa Clara. The downsizing occurred May 15, the educational tech company reported.

— Hewlett Packard Enterprise, 61 job cuts in San Jose. The reductions transpired on May 2, the information technology company disclosed.

All of the job cuts were described as permanent.

The staffing reductions come at a time when the Bay Area tech industry is struggling with its pace of hiring.

Tech companies added 100 jobs in the Bay Area in April, according to a Beacon Economics seasonally adjusted estimate of tech industry employment categories it derived from the official state EDD monthly obs report.

Employers added 1,600 tech jobs in the South Bay but slashed 1,200 tech positions in the East Bay and chopped 400 tech jobs in the San Francisco-San Mateo metro area, the Beacon estimate determined.

The puny increase in net tech hiring in the Bay Area was a reminder that rather than being the primary engine for Bay Area employment, the tech industry has begun to drag down the region’s job market.