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Intel is preparing to fire over 21,000 employees this week, Bloomberg reports, citing a person familiar with the development.
Details about the layoff are scarce, but the source tells Bloomberg that it is intended to eliminate bureaucracy, streamline management, and rebuild an engineering-driven culture at the company. This would mark the first restructuring under Lip-Bu Tan, who took over as Intel CEO last month and is scheduled to hold his first quarterly earnings call on Thursday.
It would also mark the second mass layoff at Intel in less than a year. In August, the company had cut 15,000 jobs to reduce costs, bringing down the number of employees to 108,900. The latest round of layoffs would wipe out another 20%.
In the semiconductor chips industry, Intel has been losing ground to competitors like Apple, AMD, and Nvidia, all of which outsource chip manufacturing to Taiwan-based TSMC.
In a letter to employees last month, Tan said he wasn’t deterred by challenges and was confident the team still had what it takes to win.
“We will push ourselves to develop the best products, listen intently to our customers and hold ourselves accountable to the commitments we make so that we build trust,” Tan wrote. “In areas where we have momentum, we need to double down and extend our advantage. In areas where we are behind the competition, we need to take calculated risks to disrupt and leapfrog.”
It’s unclear if President Trump’s upcoming reciprocal tariffs have anything to do with layoffs. After exempting semiconductors from his “Liberation Day” tariff announcement, Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said that chips would be tariffed under a special semiconductor category. It could potentially be 25% or higher.