Google offers ‘voluntary exit’ to all US platforms and devices employees

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"After bringing two major organizations together last year, we've got a lot of momentum," Osterloh wrote. "With so much critical work ahead, we want everyone to be fully invested in our mission and focused on delivering great products with speed and efficiency." When companies offer buyouts, it often precedes layoffs if employees don't take them up.

Google's executives announced in April under Osterloh that the streamlined approach would enable them to integrate artificial intelligence features into their products and services more efficiently.

A few months later, in October, Alphabet's chief financial officer, Anat Ashkenazi, stated that she would focus on achieving "cost efficiencies" across the company. "There's really good work that was done, started by Ruth, Sundar, and the rest of the lead team to re-engineer the cost base," she said during her first earnings call as CFO. "However, any organization can always look for ways to optimize more, and I will be exploring additional opportunities." The cost-cutting measures were partly intended to counterbalance the significant investments Google was making in artificial intelligence (AI).

Google recorded its highest-ever third-quarter sales volume for smartphones in 2024.

Recently, some Google employees have been circulating a petition asking CEO Sundar Pichai to offer a buyout option before making involuntary layoffs. "Ongoing rounds of layoffs make us feel uncertain about our jobs," the petition stated, as reported by CNBC. "The company is clearly in a healthy financial state, which makes the losses of many highly valued employees even more painful."

It appears that the voluntary exit program hasn't been extended to other divisions within Google just yet, such as search or the DeepMind artificial intelligence team.