TikTok has made several of its Australian roles redundant following large-scale layoffs affecting roughly 1,000 global employees of the social media platform.
As reported by The Information, the layoffs will impact the ByteDance-owned company’s operations, content, and marketing teams. Additionally, TikTok plans to disband its global user operations team, which handles user support and communications. The remaining employees will be reassigned to its trust and safety, marketing, content, and product teams.
“Just like all companies, we assess our business on an ongoing basis and make necessary adjustments as part of our strategy for continued growth,” A TikTok ANZ spokesperson told Mediaweek.
“Australia is an important market for TikTok and currently employs hundreds of people in offices in Sydney and Melbourne.”
The restructuring comes at a time when the company’s future in the US remains uncertain. The US Congress passed a law requiring TikTok to sever its ties with China by next year or face a ban in the country.
In April, TikTok Australia said there is no evidence for claims that the app posed a security risk to Australia.
“There is zero evidence suggesting that TikTok is in any way a national security risk, and we welcome the Prime Minister’s recent comments that his Government has no plans to ban us,” said TikTok Australia’s general manager of global business solutions for TikTok Australia, Brett Armstrong.
In July, the company held discussions with News Corp Australia over a content deal that would have seen TikTok pay News its videos. According to Capital Brief, the talks involved senior local executives from each company and were held before Meta’s announcement on 1 March that it would not renew deals with Australian news publishers.
The news follows widespread redundancies across Australia’s media industry.
This week, News Corp Australia announced it would cut 20 journalists as part of ongoing cost-saving measures following a restructure in May, which included the exit of news.com.au editor Lisa Muxworthy.
Additionally, Seven West Media plans to make up to 150 jobs redundant, following cost-cutting measures.
Nine CEO Mike Sneesby also announced the company will cut “around 200 jobs” in its publishing business to “offset the loss of revenue from the Meta deal and challenges in the advertising market.”
See also: TikTok held discussions with News Corp over a content deal