The company said it will continue to hire in ‘key strategic areas and locations’.
Workday is laying off approximately 1,750 employees, or 8.5pc of its global workforce, as the American enterprise software company looks to open itself up to the increasing demand for artificial intelligence (AI).
In an email addressed to employees yesterday (5 February), Workday CEO Carl Eschenbach said that the company needs to make these changes to “better align” its resources with its customers’ “evolving needs” in order to tap into new growth opportunities presented by AI.
According to Workday’s US Securities and Exchange Commission filing, the company also announced plans to exit some of its office spaces and noted that the restructuring will cost approximately $230m to $270m.
Eschenbach said that the company is prioritising investments into AI and platform development, “evolving” its processes to “accelerate innovation”, while “clarifying” employee roles.
According to the email, the company has begun to reach out to affected employees.
Although, Workday, which has around 2,000 employees in Dublin – its European headquarters – said it will continue to hire in “key strategic areas and locations” throughout the 2026 financial year, while also looking to expand its global footprint.
In a statement to SiliconRepublic.com, a Workday spokesperson said: “We remain committed to Dublin and we’ll continue to invest in our local innovation efforts. We are close to announcing a new location in Dublin city centre that will bring all our employees together in one building, enabling greater collaboration and creativity.”
The company’s plans for a single office in Dublin date back to 2023 when it lodged plans with the Dublin City Council for a space large enough to host 3,500 employees. However, it axed those plans in 2024.
The layoffs come less than three years after Workday announced plans to create 1,000 new jobs in Dublin by 2024, a year after creating 400 Irish jobs in 2021.
The US firm has provided enterprise cloud applications for finance, HR and student information systems since its founding in 2005. It came to Ireland in 2008 and established its European headquarters in Dublin in 2015.
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