Scale AI is cutting around 200 full-time roles—roughly 14% of its workforce—as part of a broad restructuring strategy. The move comes just weeks after Meta announced a massive $14.3 billion investment in the U.S.-based startup, acquiring a 49% stake and appointing former CEO Alexandr Wang to lead its new superintelligence lab. The layoffs will also affect approximately 500 contractors globally.
Confirming the news first reported by Bloomberg, company spokesperson Joe Osborne stated, “We are streamlining our data business.” The job cuts follow an internal email from CEO Jason Droege to staff, which was reviewed by The Verge. In the email, Droege wrote, “The reasons for these changes are straightforward: we ramped up our GenAI capacity too quickly over the past year.” He added, “While that felt like the right decision at the time, it’s clear this approach created inefficiencies and redundancies. We created too many layers, excessive bureaucracy, and unhelpful confusion about the team’s mission. Shifts in market demand also required us to re-examine our plans and refine our approach.”
Scale AI provides training data services for top AI firms including OpenAI, Google, Meta, and Anthropic. Much of its data labeling and processing work depends on a global network of contractors, many of whom operate outside the United States.
The workforce reduction comes at a challenging time for the company, which is still dealing with the fallout from a major data security lapse. A recent investigation revealed that at least 85 Google Docs containing sensitive client data and internal communications were publicly accessible. These included training prompts for Google’s Bard (now Gemini), internal evaluations of model performance, and confidential details from xAI’s “Project Xylophone.”
Some leaked spreadsheets reportedly contained personal contractor information, such as email addresses, performance notes, and payment records. One file, titled “move all cheating taskers,” listed hundreds of individuals flagged for suspected misconduct and was editable by anyone with the link.
While Scale AI claims to maintain operational independence despite Meta’s investment, the security breach has raised concerns among major clients. According to Business Insider, some partners are now reevaluating their relationships with the company, although no formal breakups have been confirmed.
