CEO Paul Bay Sunday wrote to employees that the company made the ‘difficult’ decision to lay off 850 employees over the next few months as part of a restructuring of its business aimed at optimizing costs and efficiency.

IT distribution heavyweight Ingram Micro is eliminating about 850 of its employees with a planned layoff expected to be complete by the end of the first quarter of 2025.

Ingram Micro CEO Paul Bay unveiled the planned job cuts in a letter sent Sunday to Ingram Micro employees.

In the letter, a copy of which was reviewed by CRN, Bay wrote that Ingram Micro is undertaking a “series of restructuring activities” across the company over the next three months that will result in the elimination of 850 employees.

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The restructuring includes the integration of Ingram Micro’s digital and information technology teams to reduce costs and eliminate redundancies, transforming the company’s historical shared services model into an exception-based model, and streamlining selected country, business, and functional organizations.

“We are committed to supporting affected associates through this transition and will provide more details regarding these benefits and payments through our local teams in the coming weeks. We understand that this news is difficult, and we want to acknowledge the valuable contributions of those who will be leaving Ingram Micro. These decisions are never easy, but they are necessary to position our organization for future success,” Bay wrote.

Ingram Micro did not provide more information about the layoffs in response to a CRN inquiry.

This is not the first layoff for Ingram Micro, which in October became a public company after several years as a private company. The company early this year unveiled an unspecified number of layoffs, the latest in a series of layoff rounds. Ingram Micro later reported in a regulatory filing that 503 employees were let go at the time, and that it laid off an additional 606 employees in the 39 weeks ended September 30, 2023.

Ingram Micro in an October 2024 U.S. Securities and Exchange filing said it had over 24,100 full-time employees worldwide.

Mark Essayian, president of Irvine, Calif.-based KME Systems, an Ingram Micro partner, said while the layoffs are unfortunate, he’s not surprised given that the company recently went public.

“Paul Bay is likely reviewing the company’s financials every hour of the day to make critical decisions that protect both shareholders and the company’s bottom line,” Essayian told CRN. “He’s got to optimize it for shareholder risk now. The human element is real, almost [900] people are going to lose their job.”

However, Essayian said he believes Bay has proven he knows how to run a successful company and is making “these tough choices” to ensure the business remains competitive.

Another Ingram Micro partner, James Rocker, CEO of Hauppauge, N.Y.-based MSP Nerds That Care, said he’s cautiously optimistic that the layoffs would not significantly disrupt key relationships.

“I’ve built many strong friendships at Ingram, and while these layoffs are tough I don’t foresee them affecting our ongoing collaborations,” he told CRN. “The relationships that drive the company’s success, those critical partnerships, are likely to remain untouched.”

He added that the ongoing transformation at Ingram Micro underscores the resilience and adaptability that have been “hallmarks of the company’s success.”

“Given the volatility in the tech industry right now, and the pressures of being a publicly traded company, these kinds of cuts are likely part of a strategic shift toward greater operational efficiency,” he said. “Technology companies are reinventing themselves, especially with AI and other operational advancements. Layoffs like these, while difficult, can be expected as firms adjust for long-term stability.”

For its 2024 fiscal third quarter, which ended Sept. 28, Ingram Micro reported net sales of $11.8 billion with net income of $77 million, down from $11.9 billion in sales and $86.7 million in net income for the same period a year before.

CJ Fairfield contributed to this article.