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Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

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Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#91

Post by alephxyz »

mardifoufs wrote: post #43
3qz wrote: post #8

A “startup” in Canada is just a dozen guys who stay afloat by chasing $50k government grants full time. It’s very good when these go out of business

Only $50k grants? You must have missed the AI startup wave here in Montreal. They didn't end up producing much, if anything, of value. But they sure knew how to scale those grants/"government investments" to a completely new level.

At least a few of them found a niche and are doing okay, but it was almost funny to see the number of AI startups 3-4 years ago whose business model was essentially "hope businesses pay us to apply ML libraries to their data".

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#93

Post by xal »

sbarre wrote: post #52
mabbo wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Shopify, hired like mad during the pandemic boom knowing full-well that they would end up laying off a bunch of those new hires once things got "normal" again. You should read Tobi's post about what happened. That's not how it was. https://news.shopify.com/changes-to-shopifys-team# > Before the pandemic, ecommerce growth had been steady and predictable. Was this surge to be a temporary effect or a new normal? And s…

> You should read Tobi's post about what happened. That's not how it was. I did read that back when it was posted. I hope you recognize PR when you see it? Sorry if it came across like I was saying that companies are being evil or bad or vain about how they're hiring. Quite the opposite, and more dangerously, I think companies see nothing wrong with the boom-then-bust approach to hiring, and that it's going to happen…

I write my own posts, not PR. Don’t be so jaded.

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#94

Post by throwawaysleep »

MonkeyMalarky wrote: post #84
throwawaysleep wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure of the details, but I worked for a company where SR&ED reporting and grant collecting determined product features.

Yikes,that sounds like a easy way to sink a lot of effort into something totally useless. With how mercurial the government can be with those credits it's better to do the work you need first and think about how to frame it for filing after.

I a year there and 4 product launches, we never sold a dime.

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#95

Post by walrus01 »

Canadian tech startups are hilarious. The domestic media likes to play up Hootsuite in Vancouver like it's a big deal. Maybe in the context of Vancouver's size of tech job market... But it's absolutely nothing compared to what exists in Seattle or anywhere in California or places in NY, Texas, etc.

The unfortunate lesson that every Canadian working in the tech field will learn is that if you're really talented and experienced, you're going to ultimately be faced with the stark choice of accepting a dramatically lower salary for the privilege of living and working in Vancouver or Toronto, maybe because you have family obligations or can't/won't move to the USA. While you will see your peers who are free to move take jobs at double the salary in USD-equivalent in the US.

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#96

Post by ghaff »

supernovae wrote: post #86
ghaff wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, even if there are only some actual layoffs and only some degree of hiring freezes/slowdowns/tight budgets, that translates to fewer openings with more people competing for them with lower TC being offered. The general sense among the people I talk to is that it's increasingly significantly less of an employee's market than it was 6 to 12 months ago. Nowhere near dot-bomb territory of course (and the dynamics ar…

Interesting. I haven’t seen this. Been through many hiring freezes and economic downturns but my salary has only ever gone up and if my employer tightened the reigns, i moved on. (here is your sign)- nothing really changed the market unless it was something such as 2008 meltdown with was systemic.

2008 didn't really effect tech that much. In dot-bomb, a lot of people were out of work for a long time and many left the industry. I was lucky to find something fairly quickly but it was a significant pay cut. (Not developer but in "tech").

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#97

Post by trinovantes »

cardy31 wrote: post #21

Calling Shopify a Canadian Tech Startup is really getting old. At 10k+ employees the term “startup” should really stop being applied to it. It is really big, and many of its execs are from huge American banks. So even “Canadian” may soon cease to be a valid label for it.

Yea, it's a bit silly to call the largest Canadian company by market cap a year ago a "startup"

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#98

Post by [deleted] »

MonkeyMalarky wrote: post #59
mardifoufs wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only $50k grants? You must have missed the AI startup wave here in Montreal. They didn't end up producing much, if anything, of value. But they sure knew how to scale those grants/"government investments" to a completely new level.

I would've thought the whole Element AI debacle would've reined that in but I guess not? If the patron saint of DL can't keep a startup with 100M invested in it going, I don't even know what left, right, up and down are anymore.

[deleted]

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#99

Post by stormbrew »

MonkeyMalarky wrote: post #60
mikrl wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once I looked into SRED and connected the dots, whenever I heard hypercapitalist talk at work I’d have to bite my tongue.

SR&ED is just a nice-to-have break on taxes, no?

If you work for a tech company in Canada it's likely that a substantial part of your salary is made up of sred refundable credits.

Re: Layoffs at Canadian tech startups

#100

Post by pram »

Gene_Parmesan wrote: post #48
cardy31 wrote: post #21

Calling Shopify a Canadian Tech Startup is really getting old. At 10k+ employees the term “startup” should really stop being applied to it. It is really big, and many of its execs are from huge American banks. So even “Canadian” may soon cease to be a valid label for it.

As a non-SVer, this has always been something that confused me. What is the actual definition for "startup"? It doesn't seem to be tied to age, funding level, employee counts, user counts, revenues, or really anything else at all. Honestly, it seems like a mostly self-selected tag used to indicate culture -- e.g., expectations of working conditions (hours, for instance) that in "normal" business we have long ago real…

My favorite use of 'startup' has been at giant dysfunctional orgs (like Oracle) where they structure a new product team to have a 'startup' culture.

AFAICT they think it means using kanban boards and having standup meetings.

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