Aurora Has Cut Down Its Workforce By 3%

After receiving immense popularity for its announcement of launching self-driving trucks by the end of 2024, Aurora Innovation has recently revealed that it has fired around 3% of its workforce to optimize its resources and performance. The company has its basis in Pittsburgh, with its facilities in multiple locations, including the likes of California, Texas, Colorado, and Montana. At the end of the year 2023, the autonomous vehicle company has a workforce of around 1800 employees. However, the recent 3% cut has snatched jobs from dozens of workers. As per the resources, about 54 workers have lost their positions in the enterprise, and now they will have to switch to other companies.

Layoff Reasons

Aurora has previously announced that it is working on developing autonomous self-driving trucks to minimize the workload on humans by enabling companies to acquire them to transfer goods from one place to another. While elaborating on their features, the company’s executives have confirmed that they are designed on advanced models to eliminate errors and make their work more precise and effective. Moreover, Aurora is very active in maintaining its workforce and operations to grow smoothly and effectively. In a recent organizational review, the company has found some posts and positions non-functional as it is now moving toward the launching of one of its most significant milestones, the autonomous self-driving trucks. Therefore, the owners have eliminated some roles, impacting the 3% of its total workforce.

Company’s Statement

The senior vice president of Aurora, Christopher Barrett, has stated that the company has achieved incredible success in the past few years, and it’s only because of its resource optimization and workforce management strategies. Additionally, he revealed that the recent uncertainty in the market has made the company fire almost 3% of its workforce to overcome the challenges. He appreciated the work and dedication of the workers who were impacted by the decision. Also, he confirmed that the company will support them in this dynamic and unpleasant situation.

Implications and Impacts of the Layoff

The decision to lay off 3% of employees is implemented readily to make sure that the company can estimate its resources precisely to work accordingly. Although the decision will affect the company’s working capability to some extent, Aurora possesses all the tools and strategies to overcome the challenges. It is now planning to launch its self-driving trucks, as we have mentioned previously, and the primary roots of this laying-off are also based on it. The company is hopeful to come up with a fleet of 20 self-driving trucks belonging to Class 8 by the end of 2024. In the beginning, these driverless trucks will carry the freight between Dallas and Houston, as it is the testing route. Along with it, Aurora has signed a deal with Continental on a project worth $300 million to produce autonomous vehicle hardware in bulk.