US home design website company Houzz is set to lay off nearly 100 employees in the US and Israel, about 8% of its workforce, the company has confirmed. Houzz, which was founded in San Francisco in 2009 by Israeli entrepreneurs Adi Tatarko and Alon Cohen, has developed a website, online community and software for architecture, interior design, and decorating, landscape design, and home improvement.
Houzz's first investors were Israeli serial investor Oren Zeevi and other Israelis including Oren Dobronsky and Amos Wilnai. In total Houzz has raised $663 million from large funds including Sequoia, Kleiner Perkins, NEA and Yuri Milner's DST. The company was initially founded with the aim of helping homeowners in Silicon Valley to find professionals for decorating, renovations and interior design. As its success spread it expanded worldwide and to include retail aspects like home and garden furniture.
Before the outbreak of the Covid pandemic, Houzz had been considering launching its own furniture brand but the plan was shelved.
Unlike most tech companies over the past few years, Houzz has trimmed its workforce from 1,800 in 2019 to 1,100 after the latest layoffs. In 2019 Houzz laid off 180 employees and in April 2020, the company dismissed another 155 employees.
Houzz has for many years been planning an IPO and in October 2021 filed a confidential prospectus led by Goldman Sachs, according to PitchBook. But the current state of the US capital markets and luxury real estate market means it is likely to be some time until Houzz holds a flotation.
Houzz said, "Due to the macroeconomic conditions in the home improvement and interior design industry, we have made a particularly difficult decision to cut 95 of our global workforce after the December holidays, about 8% of the total global workforce. This was communicated to our teams a few weeks ago. This is not a decision we take lightly, and we are committed to supporting the affected employees. Those affected by this are colleagues and friends, and we are grateful for their contribution to Houzz. We believe in the company's success and are confident that it will come out of this period prospering."
Houzz is headquartered in Palo Alto, California and has a development center in Azrieli Center in Tel Aviv, which employs dozens of developers and product managers. The company also has offices in London, Berlin and Sydney.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on December 20, 2022.
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