Zoom Video Communications Inc. (NASDAQ: ZM) championed remote work with its video conferencing solutions in the post-Covid world, but it is now asking its employees to come back to the office.
What Happened: Zoom has asked its 8,400-strong workforce to return to the office if they live within 50 miles of a company office. The company is enforcing a "structured hybrid approach," which applies to employees living within 50 miles of a Zoom office to be in the office for at least two days a week.
"As a company, we are in a better position to use our own technologies, continue to innovate, and support our global customers. We'll continue to leverage the entire Zoom platform to keep our employees and dispersed teams connected and working efficiently," Zoom said in a statement.
This is a bit of an irony - Zoom's success was driven by the work-from-home wave which swept companies worldwide after the Covid-19 pandemic. Its share price surged by a whopping 731% between January and October 2020 - but it is down by over 87% since peaking in October 2020.
Zoom Isn't Alone: The irony aside, Zoom is not the only company that has asked its employees to return to the office. Other big technology companies like Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) have also asked their employees to return to the office, despite intermittent protests from staff.
This has also resulted in a decline in demand for video conferencing solutions - Zoom had to let go of 1,300 of its employees in February this year. Its CEO Eric Yuan said he would take a 98% pay cut, while other executives are looking at a 20% cut in the coming year.