Qualcomm job cuts will begin hitting staff worldwide in November, after chief executive Cristiano Amon told employees of a “performance-focused” reduction in an internal memo on Monday, Reuters reported. The chipmaker (NASDAQ: QCOM) had already booked $97m in restructuring and severance charges in the first nine months of fiscal 2026, before this latest round was disclosed.
The memo, sent following annual employee reviews, did not state how many roles would go. Reuters said it could not immediately determine the scale of the cuts.
What the memo says
Amon framed the reductions as an effort to build “a stronger performance culture” and address areas where Qualcomm “has consistently fallen short of expectations,” according to the memo reviewed by Reuters. One line quoted from the document reads: “As we have expanded the business, so have the competencies and skills we require,” as carried by The Edge Malaysia’s wire pickup of the Reuters report.
Notifications to affected staff are set to begin next month. Qualcomm had roughly 52,000 employees globally at the end of fiscal 2025, according to reporting on the move by The Next Web, which also noted the company filed WARN notices covering about 105 San Diego-area jobs back in April. No 8-K or press release disclosing the November round had appeared on SEC EDGAR as of Tuesday morning.
A slip in the numbers
The job cuts follow a quarter in which Qualcomm’s results moved backward. Revenue for fiscal third quarter 2026, the three months to 28 June, came in at $9.947bn, down from $10.365bn a year earlier, according to the company’s quarterly filing with the SEC.
Net income for the same quarter fell to $2.002bn from $2.666bn, with diluted earnings per share down to $1.87 from $2.43. The decline followed a strong fiscal second quarter, when net income had reached $7.37bn on one-off items, making the subsequent drop more pronounced by comparison.
Qualcomm’s July earnings call had already flagged trouble ahead: the company forecast quarterly profit below Wall Street estimates and said revenue tied to Apple’s business would decline faster than previously expected. Management argued that growth in data-centre and non-handset markets would offset the shortfall by fiscal 2027, a case now being tested against the cost-cutting disclosed this week.
Shares lag the chip rally
Qualcomm stock has struggled to keep pace with the broader semiconductor trade this year. Shares have risen just 1.5% in 2026, against gains of more than 12% for the S&P 500 and almost 60% for the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index, according to Reuters’ wire report. The stock last traded at $171.57, down 1.29% on the day and 9.08% over the past 20 sessions, with volume running at roughly 70% of its 20-day average.
Short-selling activity gives little sign that traders had positioned ahead of the memo. FINRA’s daily short-sale ratio for the stock fell from 0.645 on 7 October to 0.453 on 19 October, the day before the memo surfaced, according to FINRA data — a declining trend rather than a build-up consistent with advance positioning.
Part of a longer pattern
This week’s memo extends a run of smaller, rolling reductions that Qualcomm has pursued through 2026 rather than announcing a single large-scale programme. The San Diego-based company’s workforce actions this year have tended to show up as localised WARN filings rather than one headline number, a pattern that may continue once November’s notifications begin.
Five senior Qualcomm executives, including Amon and chief financial officer Akash Palkhiwala, filed Form 4 disclosures with the SEC on 16 October, days before the memo went out, covering routine reporting of their holdings rather than any transaction tied to the layoffs, according to EDGAR filings.
The broader labour market backdrop has also softened. US unemployment rose to 4.2% in September from 4.1% the prior month, according to Federal Reserve data, a shift that gives tech-sector layoffs more room to run without triggering the kind of hiring squeeze seen in tighter periods.
Qualcomm has not issued a public statement confirming the scale of the cuts beyond the memo’s language. Investors are likely to press management for specifics when the company next reports quarterly results, particularly on how the reductions interact with its stated push into data-centre chips as handset revenue from Apple continues to erode.
This article is for information only and is not investment advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any asset. Markets move quickly; figures are correct as sourced at the time of writing. Always do your own research before making financial decisions.
