Snapdeal, India’s largest online marketplace is going to lay off its 600 employees soon. According to sources, the process of handing over pink slips has already started last week and people across Snapdeal, Vulcan (logistics) and Freecharge (digital payments business) are getting fired.
“On our journey towards becoming India’s first profitable e-commerce company in two years, it is important that we continue to drive efficiency across all parts of our business, which enables us to pass on the value to our consumers and sellers. We have realigned our resources and teams to further these goals and drive high-quality business growth,” an official release stated.
There are also reports of a leaked internal mail in which company’s founders Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal have pledged not to take a salary for an unspecified period.
“We believe that every resource of the company should be deployed for driving us towards profitable growth and with this announcement, both Rohit and I are taking a 100% salary cut,” the email stated.
The last 15 months have been dismal for the company’s performance. The Gurgaon based company has been hit hard by rising losses, constant changes at the top management level and the escalating growth of their rival Amazon in the same period.
In the last fiscal year, the company mounted losses of Rs 2,690 crores as compared to the revenue of Rs 1,457 crore. In the same year the employee related expenses witnessed a growth of 148 % over the previous year.
The company has a strength of 8,000 employees.
