The fitness-tracker maker Jawbone has reportedly laid off 4 percent of its workforce, or 20 people.
The company is giving the firings a positive spin, saying that the layoff is part of a restructuring and that the company could not find places for the 20 employees in the new structure. The report comes today from The Information.
The staff reduction comes right on the heels of Jawbone filing suit against its rival Fitbit in a San Francisco court. The charge? Jawbone believes that some of its employees who have left to work for Fitbit have taken sensitive information with them or accessed it online with company passwords they shouldn’t have had. (See the full text of the lawsuit here.)
In the fitness-tracker market, Jawbone ranks second to Fitbit, the market leader.
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Jawbone has long been rumored to be in poor financial health. It’s raised a significant amount of venture funding, and it most recently took a massive $300 million loan from the asset management company Blackrock.
Jawbone has also been mentioned in conversations about likely IPO candidates, but has never filed.
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