Motorola Layoffs Hit Chicago Workforce, But Moto Z Line Will Remain

Motorola is laying off a portion of its Chicago workforce, and disgruntled employees have started talking about the business decision via anonymous posts online. According to reports from these individuals, Motorola recently notified its employees of a big layoff that reportedly impacts 30- to 35-percent of its Chicago workers. This follows a similar round of layoffs that happened back in 2016.

Reports of the business matter began surfacing this week on TheLayoff.com, a website where people can anonymously report layoffs and rumors of such happening at their company. On Tuesday, one anonymous user claiming to be a Motorola employee posted a claim that half of the company's Chicago workforce was informed about an upcoming layoff this week.

According to that user, impacted employees will have their last day of work on April 6, giving them only a few weeks to find a new job. A reason for the layoff wasn't provided by that user, however.

In the same thread, multiple other alleged Motorola workers popped in with their own details, multiple of whom say the layoff is affecting between 30- and 35-percent of workers, not 50-percent as the original poster claimed. One anonymous tipster said, "I heard it was a little north of 50% of Development Engineering." The layoff reportedly is only happening at the Chicago location and is said to have been confirmed internally after weeks of rumors.

Other posters seemingly confirmed that the layoffs involved company engineers; by the sounds of it, some may have already left the company.

In a statement to GSMArena, Motorola confirmed that it is "reducing" its Chicago operations, saying this is part of a "resource action" that it announced last year. The company says the layoffs don't impact half of the workforce, as the original poster claimed; the spokesperson didn't provide any actual percentage, however. As well, the Moto Z product line won't be impacted by the workforce reduction.