Yelp Cuts Mark ‘First Wave’ of Tech Jobs Seen Lost to Pandemic

A flurry of job cuts announced this week by Yelp Inc., Eventbrite Inc. and Toast Inc. serves as a stark reminder of the deepening toll that the global coronavirus pandemic is taking on parts of the technology industry dependent on the people-to-people interaction that’s now come to a standstill.

San Francisco-based Yelp, which relies on users to pen restaurant and small business reviews, said it’s laying off 1,000 people this week and furloughing another 1,100—in all, about a third of its workforce. Ticketing company Eventbrite cut as many as 500 jobs Wednesday, roughly 45% of its total, while another 1,300 people were fired from Boston-based Toast Inc., a maker of software for restaurants. In February, Toast raised $400 million in new venture capital funding.

Those are three of the four biggest rounds of cuts from the tech industry made public since early March, according to Layoffs.fyi, which has been tracking cuts at startups and other tech companies since the coronavirus was declared a global pandemic. In all, more than 200 companies have reported more than 18,000 layoffs, according to the site. That includes hundreds of job cuts and furloughs from companies like deal site Groupon Inc. and real estate startup Redfin Corp.