Redwood Supplies has laid off about 135 workers, or about 10% of its workforce, because it reorganizes to raised accommodate its rising vitality storage enterprise, in line with a TechCrunch investigation.
As TechCrunch beforehand reported, the layoffs come simply 5 months after Redwood lower 5% of its workforce and three months after closing a $425 million funding spherical that valued the battery recycling firm at greater than $6 billion.
The battery business has been going by way of tough occasions these days. Earlier this month, battery recycler Ascend Components filed for Chapter 11 chapter, citing “insurmountable” monetary challenges. Because the U.S. auto business retreats from its most optimistic and impressive plans to transition to electrical automobiles, some battery producers have additionally restructured or gone out of enterprise.
Nevertheless, Redwood Supplies founder and CEO JB Straubel instructed workers that the brand new layoffs are usually not an indication that the corporate will proceed down the identical path.
“As we speak’s redwoods are the strongest they’ve ever been,” Straubel wrote in an e-mail to staff who weren’t laid off, in line with a duplicate seen by TechCrunch. “Our supplies enterprise is nicely on its option to profitability and now we have an thrilling roadmap forward.”
Strobel stated Redwood will “preserve going.”[s] Redwood just lately introduced agreements with Crusoe AI and, extra just lately, electrical car producer Rivian to supply recycled batteries that can be utilized to energy these firms’ services. The corporate declined to remark past the content material of Straubel’s e-mail.
In his message, Strobel stated Redwood’s “components of the corporate have expanded past what is important to help its course.” Consequently, Redwood is chopping jobs throughout a number of divisions, together with its engineering and operations organizations, stated the worker, who was granted anonymity to debate the layoffs.
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“We imagine we will ship necessary initiatives with smaller, extra targeted groups,” he wrote. “We’ve got efficiently tailored to modifications out there which have pushed lots of our rivals into chapter 11.”
Strobel went on to write down, “I’m extra excited than ever about our future growth as we construct the world’s most built-in, cost-effective crucial supplies and vitality storage enterprise.”
“This can be a self-sustaining enterprise that may proceed to extend the worth of this firm over time. We’ve got the workforce and expertise to do issues that different firms can’t do,” he wrote.
The fired workers had been instructed by Redwood’s chief human assets officer that the layoffs had been made to “strengthen our focus, work and workforce dimension to help Redwood’s future course,” in line with a duplicate of her e-mail seen by TechCrunch.
Along with severance packages and paid medical health insurance, the laid-off workers additionally obtained “profession transition help,” in line with Straubel’s e-mail.
“We want to thank the roughly 135 workers we’re saying goodbye to at this time. All of them contributed to constructing Redwood,” he wrote.
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