Uber to axe one-third of global marketing team

Uber has announced redundancies for a third of its global marketing staff as part of a wider restructure of the department. 

The taxi-hailing business has confirmed that 400 of about 1,200 marketing staff will lose their jobs.

It follows last month’s departure of chief marketing officer Rebecca Messina after less than a year in the role. At the time, chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi sad Uber would combine its marketing, communications and policy teams under Jill Hazelbaker, senior vice-president of marketing and public affairs. 

In an email to employees, reported first by The New York Times, Khosrowshahi told staff that many of the struggling businesses’ teams are "too big" and contributing to "mediocre results".

Uber floated on the New York Stock Exchange this year and made a loss of $1.01bn (£830m) in the first three months of 2019, according to its first quarterly earnings report in May. Its core ride-sharing business grew 9% year on year, while total revenue was up 20% year on year to $3.1bn. 

The company will report its second-quarter results on 8 August.