In another round of layoffs, Netflix axes 300 more employees

Streaming giant Netflix laid off another 300 workers this week, most of them from the United States, amid sinking subscriber numbers that the company said were the cause of the first round of layoffs last month.

Netflix has suffered a massive loss of subscribers this year as the streaming service grapples with political issues, inflation, and possible changes to its service causing subscribers to leave the platform in droves. Netflix reported losing 200,000 subscribers in May ahead of laying off 150 employees, and estimates it will lose 2 million by the end of July as consumers look for ways to save money due to rising inflation and soaring gas prices.

The firm announced earlier this year it is looking at adding a lower-tier subscription that would cost less but would contain ads. “We’re not adding ads to Netflix as you know it today. We’re adding an ad tier for folks who say ‘Hey, I want a lower price and I’ll watch ads’,” said Ted Sarandos, the company’s co-chief executive.

Netflix has rolled out testing of efforts to curb password-sharing in South American markets, causing some users to worry the service will cut off the ability to share accounts with people in other households.

The move has drawn outcry from customers who ask how they will share accounts with their children who are in college, or who have a shared custody arrangement and want to use the service in two homes.

“While we continue to invest significantly in the business, we made these adjustments so that our costs are growing in line with our slower revenue growth,” Netflix said in a statement on Thursday. Netflix currently has 220 million global subscribers and remains the leader in the streaming space, but has faced increasingly stiff competition from emerging new streaming services in recent years.