Klarna CEO reveals plan to reduce workforce by 50% and replace it with AI

Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski is so bullish on AI that the Swedish buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) platform plans to chop it is workforce by 50 p.c within the subsequent few years.

Chatting with the Monetary Instances, Siemiatkowski mentioned that Klarna is hoping to scale its workforce down from 3,800 to 2,000 workers. The present worker rely was already decreased from 5,000 after Klarna performed mass layoffs final 12 months. With nearly half the workforce on the firm, Siemiatkowski plans to shift customer support and advertising duties to AI. “Not solely can we do extra with much less, however we will do far more with much less,” he mentioned to the FT.

None of that is popping out of the blue. Siemiatkowski has been vocal in regards to the cost-saving advantages of AI. Klarna carried out a hiring freeze final December, with the end-goal of “shrinking” the corporate and changing sure duties with AI. In an archived submit on X that has since been deleted, Siemiatkowski acquired backlash for boasting in regards to the hundreds of thousands of {dollars} saved by automating duties like AI picture technology, implementing an AI assistant, and doing extra with half the scale of its advertising crew.

Within the quick time period, Klarna’s method appears to be paying off. As reported in its Tuesday Q2 earnings name, the BNPL firm has drastically narrowed its web losses from $84 million to $980,000 when transformed from Swedish Krona to US {dollars}. However betting huge on AI automation is of venture which may not pan out. Financial specialists in a Goldman Sachs report see “restricted US financial upside from AI,” and if historical past tells us something, automation of sure providers like self-checkout kiosks and customer support can backfire and create new issues.

Klarna is not the one tech firm to chop its workforce in favor of investing in AI. In January Duolingo lower 10 p.c of its contractors, and attributed the redundancy of staff to AI. Meta and Google have additionally laid off workers as they make investments deeper in AI.