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https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/may/09/crowdstrike-to-cut-jobs-and-use-ai>
"The cybersecurity company that became a household name after causing a massive
global IT outage last year has announced it will cut 5% of its workforce in
part due to “AI efficiency”.
In a note to staff earlier this week, released in stock market filings in the
US, CrowdStrike’s chief executive, George Kurtz, announced that 500 positions,
or 5% of its workforce, would be cut globally, citing AI efficiencies created
in the business.
“We’re operating in a market and technology inflection point, with AI reshaping
every industry, accelerating threats, and evolving customer needs,” he said.
Kurtz said AI “flattens our hiring curve, and helps us innovate from idea to
product faster”, adding it “drives efficiencies across both the front and back
office”.
“AI is a force multiplier throughout the business,” he said.
Other reasons for the cuts included market demand for sustained growth and
expanding the product offering.
The company expects to incur up to US$53m in costs as a result of the job cuts.
CrowdStrike reported in March revenue of US$1bn for the fourth financial
quarter of 2025, up 25% on the same quarter in 2024, with a loss of US$92m.
In July last year, CrowdStrike pushed out a faulty update to its software
designed to detect cybersecurity threats that brought down 8.5m Windows systems
worldwide.
The outage caused chaos at airports, and took down computers in hospitals, TV
networks, payment systems and people’s personal computers.
Aaron McEwan, vice-president of research and advisory at consultancy Gartner,
said he was sceptical when companies announced AI efficiencies close to reduced
revenue forecasts, as CrowdStrike had in March.
“I think particularly in the tech sector … it’s a way of justifying a reduction
in the workforce because [of] a financial issue,” he said. “So either they’re
not tracking well financially, or they’re trying to send a message to investors
that good times are around the corner. So I’m immediately sceptical.”"
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
