Vancouver-based software company Thinkific Labs has announced another round of layoffs, outlining plans to cut 76 employees.
With the move, Thinkific aims to hasten its path towards profitability. According to LinkedIn, Thinkific currently has a headcount of 394. Based on this total, 76 employees represent about 19 percent of the company’s staff.
“As we continue to refocus and reshape Thinkific to accelerate our growth, the time has come to return to profitability.”
-Greg Smith, Thinkific
This marks Thinkific’s second round of significant layoffs in the past year, after the firm laid off 100 employees (or 20 percent of its staff) in March 2022, around when the current economic downturn first began.
At the time, Thinkific co-founder and CEO Greg Smith cited a need for the company to cut costs and preserve cash amid tough fundraising market conditions. Since those layoffs, many other Canadian tech companies have followed suit, making similar moves for similar reasons.
According to layoff tracking website Layoffs.fyi, around 154,000 tech roles across more than 1,000 tech companies globally were eliminated in 2022. Though 2023 has only begun, per Layoffs.fyi, 37 tech companies from around the world have already cut over 18,000 employees this year.
Thinkific’s latest round of cuts, which come after BetaKit reported last month on layoffs quietly taking place at the firm, indicate that the pain is not yet over for Canadian tech companies and workers.
Founded in 2012, Thinkific helps entrepreneurs and established businesses build, market, and sell digital learning products through its software platform. The company, which serves 50,000 active creators, trades on the TSX as ‘THNC.’
RELATED: Layoffs persist at Canadian tech companies amid bleak outlook for 2023
Thinkific went public on the TSX in early 2021 at $15 per share amid what was a particularly hot year for Canadian tech startups, raising $184 million CAD in gross proceeds. But since then, market conditions have shifted, and Thinkific’s stock price has dropped to around $1.77.
“As we continue to refocus and reshape Thinkific to accelerate our growth, the time has come to return to profitability,” wrote Smith in a January 10 letter to employees announcing the latest staff cuts. “To do that, we needed to make some hard decisions on people, programs and investments.”
According to Smith, with these layoffs, profitability is now in sight for Thinkific. According to Thinkific, the cuts align its workforce with key growth initiatives and will enable the firm to achieve positive adjusted earnings before income, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) by the end of 2023.
Feature image courtesy Thinkific.
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