0G Labs is replacing around 25 percent of its workforce with AI. Employees should use AI every day to achieve “20 times” their previous performance.
0G Labs, a San Francisco startup developing blockchains for AI agents, says it is cutting a quarter of its workforce because its agents are so good at taking over human tasks.
0G Labs announced the decision last week in an email from CEO Michael Heinrich, which we have obtained.
Heinrich explained that the company is becoming a “leaner, faster, AI-native company” and is now focused on scaling up AI rather than headcount.
“Every day we talk about a world in which AI agents do work that humans shouldn’t have to do,” he said in his email. “It’s time to start working like this yourself.”
The email goes on to say that employees should use AI every day to achieve “20 times” their previous performance, while human judgment remains “essential.”
0G Labs said in a statement that layoff decisions are “never easy,” but the efficiency gains from AI agents are real.
The startup is worth two billion dollars
“As a company developing AI infrastructure, we believe in working with the same technology that we provide to others,” said a spokesperson.
0G Labs said it had raised around $350 million in capital by last year and had reached a valuation of $2 billion. The company was featured in a Business Insider article about AI unicorns with very small teams at the time, which wrote that 0G Labs had around 40 employees.
The startup’s crypto token, $0G, has fallen more than 80% in price since its launch last year, according to CoinMarketCap. 0G Labs did not comment on whether this influenced the decision to cut jobs.
AI-driven layoffs have hit the tech industry hard after technology advanced in leaps and bounds over the holidays — a period some dubbed “Claude Christmas,” in reference to Anthropic’s chatbot.
In February, fintech company Block cut nearly half of its workforce due to AI, while Coinbase announced on Tuesday that it would also lay off 14% of its employees due to AI.