Sequoia Capital has reportedly laid off seven members of its talent team, representing one-third of the group charged with helping startups in its portfolio recruit employees.
The Menlo Park-based firm let go the employees Friday, Forbes reported Monday. The move came about four months after Jamie Bott, who headed the team, left Sequoia, according to Forbes.
With startups and other companies retrenching amid a dramatic fall-off in venture funding over the last year, there's been less need for the talent team's services, Sumaiya Balbale, an operating partner at Sequoia, told Forbes.
"Especially during the peak years of 2021 and 2022, the talent needs of our portfolio tripled," Balbale said. "As the market corrected, there was a pause and the number of inbound requests and hiring needs that our companies were asking of us decreased."
Sequoia representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The layoffs come during a tumultuous period for the venerable venture firm, which has $85 billion in assets under management and $9.6 billion in uninvested capital, according to PitchBook Data. In recent months, according to published reports, five investing partners have either left or are leaving Sequoia, including Michael Moritz, its former chairman and co-leader. Last month, Sequoia announced it would spit its U.S. and Europe, India and Southeast Asia, and China units into three separate entities by the end of March.
Meanwhile, the firm is dealing with the aftermath of the collapse of FTX Trading Ltd. Sequoia lost $214 million when the cryptocurrency exchange operator went into bankruptcy last year. In February, former FTX customers sued Sequoia, Thoma Bravo and Paradigm Operations, charging that the investment firms helped convince them to invest with FTX by making allegedly false statements about the safety and viability of the startup and its service.
