Dropbox layoffs will impact 11 percent of staff at the cloud file sharing company, and Chief Operating Officer Olivia Nottebohm will leave Dropbox in February, according to an SEC filing.
In an email to staff, CEO Drew Houston said the layoffs will involve 315 staff cuts. In the note, Houston stated:
"I realize this is incredibly hard on the Dropboxers and their families who are impacted, and I take full responsibility for this decision. This is one of the toughest decisions I’ve had to make in my 14 years as CEO.
To each of you who are affected, I am truly sorry. Please know that this is not a reflection on you. You’ve played an important part in the Dropbox story, and I will always be grateful for everything that you’ve done for this company."
Looking ahead, Houston said Dropbox's top priorities for 2021 include:
- Evolving the core Dropbox experience that hundreds of millions of customers around the world rely on;
- investing in new products built for distributed work; and
- driving operational excellence.
Related List: All Technology Industry Company Layoffs (2016 to present)
Dropbox: A Buyout/Takeover Target?
Still, Dropbox faces growing competition from major cloud providers like Microsoft and Google, coupled with traditional competition from Box.
Dropbox's stock ($DBX) rose in December 2020 when The Information speculated the company could be a takeover target in 2021. But shares fell about 6 percent today on the layoff news.
Dropbox's revenue was $$487.4 million in Q3 of 2020, up 14% from the corresponding quarter in 2019. Dropbox is expected to announce Q4 2020 results on February 25, 2021, according to Investing.com.
