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Patreon sent a “painful” memo to staff regarding the layoff of 20% of its workforce, or about 93 people, as the platform responds to market changes.
Patreon CEO Jack Conte sent a memo to employees on Thursday announcing the layoff of 20% of its workforce, affecting 93 employees. The memo was shared online by the company and asserted that Patreon’s core business remains strong but must respond to market changes and adjust its cost structure to retain stability.
“AI has fundamentally transformed the tech industry,” wrote Conte, noting that the pace of change has “never been more intense.” However, Conte stressed that the job cuts aren’t the result of wanting to replace employees with AI.
“The more we have learned to use these new tools, the clearer it has become that they are not substitutes for the creativity, judgement, detail orientation, or craftsmanship that our teammates have in spades, nor do they replace the desire for human connection that all of us cherish so deeply,” Conte explained. “That’s my personal opinion, but more importantly, it’s the foundation of Patreon’s strategy: our product vision and business are both predicated on the value of human creativity and human connection.”
The move comes amid continued ambivalence in the tech and creative industries, between the looming presence of AI and broader economic uncertainty. It’s a landscape that isn’t terribly flattering to direct-to-fan subscription services such as what Patreon provides.
In addition to the layoffs, Patreon is also restructuring how it operates by “flattening” its organizational chart and refocusing teams around its top priorities. Employees affected by the job cuts will receive at least 16 weeks of severance pay, plus an additional week for every year worked, healthcare coverage through the end of the year, and a $1,500 stipend to replace their company laptop.
The latest round of layoffs is Patreon’s largest since it cut 17% of staff in 2022, during which it also shuttered its offices in Dublin and Berlin.
Last week, the company announced a partnership with internet infrastructure provider Cloudflare to directly block access to AI bots designed to train their models on creators’ work without authorization. Patreon said it had to enhance its efforts on that front because AI scraping has become continually more sophisticated.