Media needs to find out something is happening before they can report on it. They had one press release to go by. Now that things are coming out, so is the media coverage. For example:
https://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2022/07/19/job-cuts-genetic-testing-invitae-nvta-randy-scott.html
I think that the reports saying 'more than 1000 or 1200' don't really emphasize what a huge proportion of the Invitae work force that represents!
https://twitter.com/TheLayoff/status/1549148790573060096
In case you need the text:
Genetic testing firm Invitae to cut 1,000 jobs as CEO steps down
Genetic testing company Invitae Corp. will cut 1,000 jobs as its CEO steps down and co-founder Randy Scott returns as chairman.
The San Francisco-based company (NASDAQ: NVTA), which has used acquisitions and partnerships with the dr-g industry to expand its services and grow genetic tests' ability to spot diseases in people, said the restructuring will shed $326 million in annual costs and will be completed by mid-2023.
Invitae expects to take a $75 million to $100 million charge related to the restructuring plus a non-cash charge that it said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing it is not able to estimate.
As part of the plan, Invitae co-founder and CEO and executive chairman, Randy Scott, is returning to the company as chairman, and COO Ken Knight will succeed Sean George as CEO.
The company, which at the stock market's close Monday was down 18 cents to $2.67 per share, lost another 27 cents in pre-market trading Tuesday.
Invitae plans to streamline its international operations by focusing on fewer than a dozen countries, leaving countries where the genetic testing business is "less developed," it said. It also plans to consolidate office and laboratory space.
Invitae, which said it expects to have cash, restricted cash and marketable securities of $737 million as of June 30 and preliminary second-quarter revenue of about $136 million, has been one of the most acquisitive companies in the nascent genetic testing business. Those rollups have helped the company expand its test menu and suite of products for customers to "manage" their genome, the complete set of genetic material in cells.
Now the company, which said it plans to lower its cash burn from the previously guided $600 million-$650 million this year to $225 million-$275 million next year, expects to focus on its core testing business to lower the cost of goods sold and speed its path to positive cash flow, cutting or putting on hold some initiatives.
It bought a 100% equity interest in Genelex Solutions LLC and YouScript Inc. in April 2020, bringing on pharmacogenetics — the science of how a person's genes affect how they respond to medications — and clinical decision support. In October 2020, it bought ArcherDX Inc., in February 2021 bought microbiome sequencing company One Codex, two months later acquired genomic laboratory services company Genosity Inc. and last September bought Ciitizen Corp., a health technology company.
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"Our role is to provide best-in-class genomic information from birth to death," George said during the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference earlier this year, including structuring medical record information to make it more usable.
The genetic testing industry is maturing, he said, from its academic roots to "something a little more industrialized. It will consolidate down to a few leading the vanguard."
Now George will serve as a consultant while retaining a spot on the Invitae board.
Knight, the new CEO who joined Invitae as COO in July 2020, previously was a vice president at Amazon for more than four years, a general manager of Caterpillar Inc.'s integrated manufacturing operations division and a former General Motors Corp. plant manager and executive director of global manufacturing engineering. At Invitae, the company said, he has led efforts to improve "revenue quality" and "driven steady increases in variable cost productivity."
Scott, meanwhile, founded Invitae with George. He stepped aside as CEO in 2017, with George taking his place, and was executive chairman from 2017 to 2019.