Daily Times

Swedish music streaming giant Spotify said Monday it was cutting six percent of its roughly 10,000 employees in the latest cost-cutting announcement among technology companies. The company did not specify where the cuts will be made.

“In hindsight, I was too ambitious in investing ahead of our revenue growth. And for this reason, today, we are reducing our employee base by about six percent across the company,” Spotify chief executive Daniel Ek said on Spotify’s official blog.

“I take full accountability for the moves that got us here today,” Ek added.

The 39-year-old CEO added that over the next several hours “one-on-one conversations will take place with all impacted employees.”

Shares in the Sweden-based company, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, rose over 4.5 percent following the announcement in out-of-hours trading.

Spotify has invested heavily since its launch to fuel growth with expansions into new markets and, in later years, exclusive content such as podcasts. It has invested over a billion dollars into podcasts alone and raised hackles last year as it signed a $100 million multi-year deal with controversial star podcaster Joe Rogan.

The company has never posted a full-year net profit despite its success in the online music market.

In 2017, the company had around 3,000 staff members, more than tripling the figure to around 9,800 at the end on 2022.