After its acquisition of Evernote, the Milan-based app development company, Bending Spoons, has made significant workforce cuts in the note-taking and task management app.
According to a spokesperson from Evernote, 129 people were affected by the layoffs that occurred on February 17. “This was a difficult but necessary decision as we pursue our ambitious plans for Evernote,” the spokesperson told TechCrunch via email. “The company has been unprofitable for years, and the situation was unsustainable in the long term.”
The spokesperson declined to specify which particular departments were impacted. However, reports on LinkedIn and Blind suggest that the layoffs touched several critical Evernote teams, including product design, engineering, HR, sales, customer service, and marketing departments.
Evernote has experienced many ups and downs over the past few decades, including significant workforce cuts in 2015 and 2018, along with an exodus of top executives, such as its chief technical officer, chief financial officer, chief product officer, and head of HR. However, the company seemed to have turned things around, reporting $100 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR) within the last five years.
While it is unlikely that Bending Spoons was hurting for liquidity, the company did recently secure a $340 million venture round and exceeded $100 million in ARR in September of last year. So, what led to these cuts?
One reason could be that Bending Spoons is aiming to make Evernote profitable. The corporate parent wants a quick return on its investment and is probably feeling additional pressure from investors. It’s also true that Evernote wasn’t particularly competitive, relying heavily on a consumer-focused freemium model while avoiding the types of collaboration features embraced by its rivals, such as Notion.
In any case, the layoffs are unfortunate and are an outcome of the current circumstances.