OYO lays off 600 employees in tech; to hire 250 for sales

IPO-bound hotel aggregator Oyo is letting go of 600 employees of its employee base of 3,700, mostly involved in tech roles in product and engineering teams, according to a statement by the company.

The tech team was into developing pilots and proof of concepts such as in-app gaming, social content curation, and patron-facilitated content. In 2020, the company had laid off 300 people.

However, the startup will now be hiring 250 employees, primarily to its relationship management team, in the coming months to ensure better consumer and partner satisfaction, and in business development teams to help scale up the number of hotels & homes on its platform.

The company said the move is part of its wide-ranging changes in its organisational structure. OYO said that it will also be merging its product and engineering teams for smooth functioning.

Additionally, members of projects which have now been successfully developed and deployed such as ‘Partner SaaS’ are being either let go of or are being redeployed in core product and tech areas such as AI-driven pricing, ordering, and payments.

As the integration of various functions of its European vacation homes business progresses, the company also said it is downsising some parts of the business to increase efficiency and harness synergies. The company has also reassessed its corporate headquarters base afresh and is merging congruent roles and flattening team structures where needed.

OYO said it will be helping as many employees as it can in the outplacement and will continue its medical insurance coverage ranging between three months on average.

Ritesh Agarwal, Founder and Group CEO, OYO, said,

“We will be doing all that we can to ensure that most of the people we are having to let go are gainfully employed. Every member of the OYO team and I myself will proactively endorse the strength of each of these employees. It is unfortunate that we are having to part ways with a lot of these talented individuals who have made valuable contributions to the company. As OYO grows and a need for some of these roles emerges in the future, we commit to reaching out to them first and offering them the opportunity.”

OYO reported a loss of Rs 333 crore in the quarter ending September 2022—down from Rs 414 crore in the previous quarter, according to its second addendum. The company registered a 23% increase in gross booking value (GBV) per hotel in the last quarter ending September, compared to the previous quarter.

OYO filed its draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) for its Rs 8,000 crore public listing in October last year.

Last month, the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) stayed the penalty of Rs 169 crore imposed on the company by the Competition Commission of India (CCI). The CCI had fined OYO and MakeMyTrip following the allegations by FHRAI of anti-competitive practices.

(The story was updated after receiving a statement by OYO)