Walmart plans to close three US technology hubs. As a result, hundreds of workers will have to move to keep their jobs. Tech hubs in Austin, Texas, Carlsbad, California and Portland, Oregon are closing. Employees from those locations are being offered transfers to other primary offices in San Bruno, California, or the company’s headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas. If employees choose to leave, Walmart will offer to pay for the transfers or severance pay. The Wall Street Journal assessed a memo confirming planned closures.
Employees at Walmart’s Bentonville headquarters were mandated to work in the office all five days of the week by 2022. two days a week. This decision ties in with a general trend for personal work and central offices. Companies like Activision Blizzard Inc. and Walt Disney Co. have adopted similar internal policies.
Before the closures, Walmart had six international tech hub locations and 11 in the US. The retailer is reportedly planning to open new tech hubs in Atlanta and Toronto and add thousands of additional employees to its tech team — about 20,000 people worldwide. Walmart has more than 1.5 million U.S. employees, mostly hourly workers in stores and warehouses, and just over half a million other workers abroad. The company recently announced plans to increase its minimum wages in the US in a difficult labor market situation for hourly wage earners.
The move is a step back from Walmart’s previous stance on remote work, when it aimed to make “virtual work the new normal for global technology,” according to a 2020 LinkedIn post by Suresh Kumar. At the time, it seemed that the group wanted to invent the workspace of the future. Now it looks like Walmart is just trying to keep up with the industry trend for personal work.
