iHeart Media will lay off employees this week.
The radio and podcasting company plans to lay off less than 5 percent of its current approximately 10,000 employees. The job cuts are aimed at eliminating redundancies and streamlining operations, a person familiar with the matter confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter.
“We have a larger audience for broadcast radio than we did 10 years ago, and according to Nielsen Edison, we have a growing number of Gen Z listeners.We are the #1 podcast publisher. , which is larger than the next two companies combined and five times the size of the next largest digital radio service.We can achieve this by modernizing our company and increasing our use of technology. We are now able to build the best radio station with the best talent in any market.”
“These changes are another step in that journey. Few jobs are affected in a company with 10,000 employees, but some jobs are. No matter how few jobs are affected. , we do not take this step lightly. All of our team members are important to us and we respect and appreciate them,” the statement continued.
The company is scheduled to announce third-quarter results on Thursday. In its last earnings report, iHeartMedia reported an operating loss of $910 million, wider than the $897 million loss in Q2 2023. Podcasting is a strength and drives revenue across the company’s digital audio group. But iHeartMedia otherwise saw its consolidated second-quarter revenue increase just 1% last quarter to $929 million.
