(Bloomberg) — Payments startup Bolt Financial Inc. is cutting staff, its chief executive officer, Maju Kuruvilla, said in a message to employees on Wednesday.
“It’s no secret that the market conditions across our industry and the tech sector are changing,” Kuruvilla said in the message reviewed by Bloomberg.
“In an effort to ensure Bolt owns its own destiny, the leadership team and I have made the decision to secure our financial position.” The company began holding meetings with employees Wednesday morning, and posted the CEO’s message on its blog.
A spokeswoman for the company declined to specify how many jobs would be cut.
Bolt was most recently valued by investors at $11 billion, a pricetag that made it one of the most valuable startups in the US.
The company’s software aims to provide retailers with one-click online checkout options. But Bolt has run into trouble recently: The startup was sued by its most prominent customer, which claimed that its technology did not work as promised.
Bolt, founded in 2014, has garnered national attention for giving employees Fridays off and for the tweetstorms of its colorful co-founder, Ryan Breslow.
Earlier this year Breslow claimed in a series of tweets that Silicon Valley’s elite is a “boys club” full of “mob bosses.” Breslow stepped down as CEO soon after the tweets, becoming the company’s executive chairman.
After Bolt closed its latest funding round, the startup started trying to raise more money at an even higher $14 billion valuation.
However, that fundraising effort didn’t come to fruition. In his note to staff, Kuruvilla said that the startup would aim to “reach profitability with the money we have already raised.”
Bolt is not the only company that has laid off staff in recent weeks, as public markets hammer tech stocks.
Venture backed startups have cut thousands of jobs this spring, according to employment tracker Layoffs.fyi.
(Updates with context starting in the third paragraph.)
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