Tidal to lay off 10 per cent of staff

Tidal has laid off 40 members of staff across multiple departments, amounting to 10 per cent of its total staff.

The music streaming service is owned by Twitter founder Jack Dorsey’s company Block, which has been making layoffs across its many branches, which also include Square and Cash App.

As reported by Bloomberg, the layoffs include Jeff Benjamin, a former member of Tidal’s editorial team, along with other members of the editorial staff.

In a statement from the company, they said: “As part of Block and its recent announcement to cap the number of employees at the company to focus on business growth, TIDAL has carefully considered how to right-size our team to ensure we are able to continue to build and invest in critical areas of the business.”

“We do not take these decisions lightly, and we are sincerely grateful for the contributions of our impacted teammates.”

Earlier this week, Spotify also announced that they were cutting down 17 per cent of its workforce in order to save costs. The streaming platform had previously laid off 6 per cent of its staff earlier in the year.

Spotify chief executing Daniel Ek said that the recent decision was made as economic growth had “slowed dramatically”. It is thought that around 1,500 jobs were lost in the latest round of layoffs.

It was announced in March 2021 that Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, who is also the CEO of Square, was buying the streaming platform from Jay-Z in a $297million (£236million) deal, with the deal being completed later that year.

At the time, Dorsey explained why he decided to incorporate TIDAL into his financial services company. “It comes down to a simple idea: finding new ways for artists to support their work,” he wrote.

“New ideas are found at the intersections, and we believe there’s a compelling one between music and the economy. Making the economy work for artists is similar to what Square has done for sellers.”

Jay-Z launched TIDAL in 2015, and his net worth grew by 40 per cent after he sold it, as well as his champagne brand Armand de Brignac.

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