JANUARY 27, 2004 —
Without official comment, insiders are reporting that the company is planning to eliminate approximately 20% of its workforce in the next few weeks. 500 employees are at risk.
OCTOBER 14, 2023 — ANOTHER 600 EMPLOYEES
In a second round of layoffs, Flexport is implementing another 20% workforce reduction to curtail financial losses.
The reduction in force will impact 600 employees.
According to Ryan Petersen, who took back control from his handpicked successor Dave Clark…
“Customers need to be able to count on Flexport as a reliable partner for their supply chain. Over the last month my leadership team and I evaluated every role in the company and its relationship to solving important supply chain problems for our customers. As a result, we are confident that this reduction in force will not impact the customer experience we provide to our customers today.”
“I have a difficult decision to share: We will reduce the size of our global team by approximately 20% with the process starting tomorrow, Friday, October 13.
To those who are leaving, thank you again for everything you have done, and I hope that your experience at this company will help you as you pursue the next steps in your career.
What This Restructuring Means for Our Customers
Customers need to be able to count on Flexport as a reliable partner for their supply chain. Over the last month my leadership team and I evaluated every role in the company and its relationship to solving important supply chain problems for our customers. As a result, we are confident that this reduction in force will not impact the customer experience we provide to our customers today.
With more than $1 billion in net cash, following this change, Flexport is now in a great position to take advantage of the opportunities in front of us to return to profitability as soon as the end of next year. I’ve spoken to more than 100 of our top customers in my first month back as CEO, and hope to talk to hundreds more in the months to come. It's clear that our customers want us to be a profitable company they can rely on to solve important problems in their supply chain.
With today’s change, we'll be able to get back to profitability without raising prices or placing our fortress balance sheet at risk. Instead, our path to profitability runs through delivering outstanding global logistics and technology solutions that solve customer problems. We will continue to relentlessly focus on the quality of our services as measured by on-time execution, quote to invoice accuracy, shipment milestone accuracy, direct customer feedback and net promoter scores.
Today’s change does not change our commitment to pursuing our long-term technology vision. We see endless opportunities for technology to improve on-time performance and reliability, upgrade compliance processes, and save businesses money in their global supply chain. We are the technology leader in this space and will continue to accelerate. With a flatter organizational structure, our talented tech teams will be able to make quicker decisions and deliver technology across as many customers and use cases as possible. Businesses come to Flexport for technology that improves reliability, visibility, and control over their supply chains, but they stay and grow with us because of the passion and expertise of our people. That won't change, as we are more committed than ever to our customers.
Today is a tough day, but we are a resilient, purpose-driven team that will overcome this setback and deliver on the promise of our mission of making global commerce so easy that there will be more of it.
I’m proud to lead this team to our full potential in the many years to come. — Rya
JANUARY 30, 2023 — Original post…
San Francisco, California-based Flexport, operators of a supply chain management and logistics platform providing order management, trade financing, insurance, freight forwarding, and customs brokerage services, has announced a reduction in force.
The reduction will impact 20% of the company's workforce or 700 employees.
A statement from Co-CEOs Dave Clark and Ryan Petersen...
While we are looking forward to what's to come in 2023, we must also make hard decisions necessary to set us up for long-term success. We are overall in a good position, but are not immune to the macroeconomic downturn that has impacted businesses around the world. Our customers have been impacted by these challenging conditions, resulting in a reduction to our volume forecasts through 2023. Lower volumes, combined with improved efficiencies as a result of new organizational and operational structures, means we are overstaffed in a variety of roles across the company.
As a result, today we are reducing the size of our organization and we will, unfortunately, say goodbye to a group of talented Flexporters. We are grateful for the contributions of those who are leaving, and each departing Flexporter has our gratitude for their contributions to the company. They will be treated with respect and dignity as their Flexport chapter comes to a close, and we wish them great success in their future endeavors.
The current slowdown in volume gives us time to focus on building our technology bench while the economy lags. Then, as the economy recovers, we will be ready to be the Flexport that we all want to be–the one-stop for customers to make the movement of goods around the world easy. But to do that, we're going to need to be nimble, fiscally responsible, and focused on building fast with operational excellence.
We will come out of this economic downturn fit and up for any fight – to be our best and continue delivering amazing value and service for customers.
Dave and Ryan
Change is coming. There will always be a tomorrow, no matter how much you may try to ignore it. There are no guarantees in life or promises for a bright future. We see good people being laid off through no fault of their own. Just because something bad hasn't happened yet, doesn't mean it won't. It can happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere. No one is guaranteed to wake up tomorrow and still have a job by evening. Are you now wondering, Am I Next?