Holiday Ayo - ByteDance reportedly terminated employment or laid off hundreds of employees at TikTok Shop and Tokopedia in Indonesia. The company did not confirm or deny this news.

Minister of Manpower (Menaker) Yassierli said that his party would still review the news about the e-commerce layoffs.

"We'll review it later," said Yassierli, Thursday (5/6).

When asked further whether there had been a report of layoffs, Yassierli gave a similar answer.

"We'll review it later," he said.

As previously reported, hundreds of TikTok Shop employees in Indonesia were forced to be cut or laid off. This employee efficiency has come under the spotlight because TikTok admitted that it continues to strengthen its investment in Indonesia.

The layoffs of the e-commerce business unit owned by ByteDance Ltd. were carried out as an effort to cut costs after the merger with Tokopedia in 2024.

A TikTok spokesperson said that after the merger with Tokopedia, the company intensively carried out an evaluation of business needs.

"We routinely evaluate business needs," said a TikTok spokesperson.

Since the acquisition, TikTok has admitted that it continues to utilize Tokopedia's resources or strengths, including its employees.

However, the social media platform also had to cut costs after merging with the Indonesian marketplace last year.

In fact, management is currently focusing on implementing business adjustments to improve better services for its users.

"We are making adjustments to strengthen the organization and provide better services to users," he explained.

Quoted from Bloomberg, Sunday (1/6), TikTok Shop is cutting staff in all e-commerce teams, including logistics, operations, marketing, and warehousing.

A source who asked not to be named said that further steps regarding TikTok Shop layoffs will be taken no earlier than July 2025.

Later, the layoffs will make Tokopedia and TikTok Shop only have around 2,500 employees in total in Indonesia.