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The Verily website is displayed on a laptop computer in an arranged photograph taken in Arlington, Virginia, on Thursday, May 7, 2020.

Andrew Harrer | Bloomberg | Getty Images

In an email to employees on Wednesday, Verily CEO Stephen Gillett said the company will lay off 15% of its staff in a restructuring move, as it strives for financial independence from parent company Alphabet. The cuts will affect about 240 people, a Verily spokesperson confirmed.

Verily, which specializes in health sciences, is one of Google’s sister companies, operating within Alphabet’s “Other Bets” category.

It’s the first known layoff to hit the Google parent company following a wave of industry layoffs and fears of a recession. Although Google has so far avoided the widespread job cuts that have hit other tech companies like Meta, employees have grown anxious if they could be next, CNBC has reported.

Gillett’s email instructed staff to work from home for the remainder of the week as Verily’s physical offices will be closed on Thursday and Friday. “Those who are in the office the office today can return home now,” it stated, specifying that the instruction also goes for employees who work from Google offices.

Some of Verily’s projects have included a contact lens that can detect diabetes symptoms, which was halted in 2018, and Project Baseline, an effort to aggregate health data with research organizations. It also provided a Covid-19 testing platform, which former President Trump highlighted at the start of the pandemic. 

Some of Alphabet’s Other Bets include their own equity structure, CFO Ruth Porat explained in 2019, and Verily has been raising money from outside investors for several years. In 2017, Verily took in $800 million of outside capital from Singapore’s Temasek, and has since raised more than $2 billion in several more equity rounds.

Gillett said the cuts reflect discontinued programs and team “redundancy,” according to the emails, which were viewed by CNBC. It says it will offer severance and outplacement services “in the coming weeks and months” but did not provide details yet.

Gillett’s note stated that it will be “reducing or sunsetting” some parts of the business while increasing investment in others. Specifically, Verily will be discontinuing some early stage products, including “remote patient monitoring for heart failure and micro needles for drug delivery,” the email states. “We cannot do everything and have had to make some difficult choices,” wrote Gillett. The email said the company would hold an all-hands meeting Jan. 18 to explain the changes in more detail.

Gillett’s note also outlines several executive changes and the departure of Jordi Parramon, the president of Verily’s devices businesses who had been with the company “since its early days.”

The note said the company will notify laid off employees with an email sent to their Verily and personal emails entitled “Important Update Regarding Your Role.” Those who still have jobs will receive an email titled “Your Role at Verily.” Those who work out of the U.S. will hear from their business leaders on Wednesday or Thursday, the note stated.

“While communicating via email is not ideal, this was a deliberate decision, enabling us to communicate as efficiently and simultaneously as possible. We’re also taking today and the rest of the week to ensure each impacted Veep has a personal discussion with a leader and HR partner to discuss the details, answer questions, and provide support through the transition,” read the note.

“As we move into Verily’s next chapter, we are doubling down on our purpose, with the goal to ultimately be operating in all areas of precision health,” the note stated. “We will do this by building the data and evidence backbone that closes the gap between research and care. We will also focus on building a financially independent company and a thriving company culture.”

Alphabet and Verily declined to comment further.

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Google agrees to pay Texas $1.4 billion data privacy settlement

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Google agrees to pay Texas .4 billion data privacy settlement

A Google corporate logo hangs above the entrance to the company’s office at St. John’s Terminal in New York City on March 11, 2025.

Gary Hershorn | Corbis News | Getty Images

Google agreed to pay nearly $1.4 billion to the state of Texas to settle allegations of violating the data privacy rights of state residents, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said Friday.

Paxton sued Google in 2022 for allegedly unlawfully tracking and collecting the private data of users.

The attorney general said the settlement, which covers allegations in two separate lawsuits against the search engine and app giant, dwarfed all past settlements by other states with Google for similar data privacy violations.

Google’s settlement comes nearly 10 months after Paxton obtained a $1.4 billion settlement for Texas from Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to resolve claims of unauthorized use of biometric data by users of those popular social media platforms.

“In Texas, Big Tech is not above the law,” Paxton said in a statement on Friday.

“For years, Google secretly tracked people’s movements, private searches, and even their voiceprints and facial geometry through their products and services. I fought back and won,” said Paxton.

“This $1.375 billion settlement is a major win for Texans’ privacy and tells companies that they will pay for abusing our trust.”

Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said the company did not admit any wrongdoing or liability in the settlement, which involves allegations related to the Chrome browser’s incognito setting, disclosures related to location history on the Google Maps app, and biometric claims related to Google Photo.

Castaneda said Google does not have to make any changes to products in connection with the settlement and that all of the policy changes that the company made in connection with the allegations were previously announced or implemented.

“This settles a raft of old claims, many of which have already been resolved elsewhere, concerning product policies we have long since changed,” Castaneda said.

“We are pleased to put them behind us, and we will continue to build robust privacy controls into our services.”

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Virtual chronic care company Omada Health files for IPO

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Virtual chronic care company Omada Health files for IPO

Omada Health smart devices in use.

Courtesy: Omada Health

Virtual care company Omada Health filed for an IPO on Friday, the latest digital health company that’s signaled its intent to hit the public markets despite a turbulent economy.

Founded in 2012, Omada offers virtual care programs to support patients with chronic conditions like prediabetes, diabetes and hypertension. The company describes its approach as a “between-visit care model” that is complementary to the broader health-care ecosystem, according to its prospectus.

Revenue increased 57% in the first quarter to $55 million, up from $35.1 million during the same period last year, the filing said. The San Francisco-based company generated $169.8 million in revenue during 2024, up 38% from $122.8 million the previous year.

Omada’s net loss narrowed to $9.4 million during its first quarter from $19 million during the same period last year. It reported a net loss of $47.1 million in 2024, compared to a $67.5 million net loss during 2023.

The IPO market has been largely dormant across the tech sector for the past three years, and within digital health, it’s been almost completely dead. After President Donald Trump announced a sweeping tariff policy that plunged U.S. markets into turmoil last month, taking a company public is an even riskier endeavor. Online lender Klarna delayed its long-anticipated IPO, as did ticket marketplace StubHub.

But Omada Health isn’t the first digital health company to file for its public market debut this year. Virtual physical therapy startup Hinge Health filed its prospectus in March, and provided an update with its first-quarter earnings on Monday, a signal to investors that it’s looking to forge ahead.

Omada contracts with employers, and the company said it works with more than 2,000 customers and supports 679,000 members as of March 31. More than 156 million Americans suffer from at least one chronic condition, so there is a significant market opportunity, according to the company’s filing.

In 2022, Omada announced a $192 million funding round that pushed its valuation above $1 billion. U.S. Venture Partners, Andreessen Horowitz and Fidelity’s FMR LLC are the largest outside shareholders in the company, each owning between 9% and 10% of the stock.

“To our prospective shareholders, thank you for learning more about Omada. I invite you join our journey,” Omada co-founder and CEO Sean Duffy said in the filing. “In front of us is a unique chance to build a promising and successful business while truly changing lives.”

WATCH: The IPO market is likely to pick up near Labor Day, says FirstMark’s Rick Heitzmann

The IPO market is likely to pick up near Labor Day, says FirstMark's Rick Heitzmann

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Google would need to shift up to 2,000 employees for antitrust remedies, search head says

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Google would need to shift up to 2,000 employees for antitrust remedies, search head says

Liz Reid, vice president, search, Google speaks during an event in New Delhi on December 19, 2022.

Sajjad Hussain | AFP | Getty Images

Testimony in Google‘s antitrust search remedies trial that wrapped hearings Friday shows how the company is calculating possible changes proposed by the Department of Justice.

Google head of search Liz Reid testified in court Tuesday that the company would need to divert between 1,000 and 2,000 employees, roughly 20% of Google’s search organization, to carry out some of the proposed remedies, a source with knowledge of the proceedings confirmed.

The testimony comes during the final days of the remedies trial, which will determine what penalties should be taken against Google after a judge last year ruled the company has held an illegal monopoly in its core market of internet search.

The DOJ, which filed the original antitrust suit and proposed remedies, asked the judge to force Google to share its data used for generating search results, such as click data. It also asked for the company to remove the use of “compelled syndication,” which refers to the practice of making certain deals with companies to ensure its search engine remains the default choice in browsers and smartphones. 

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Google pays Apple billions of dollars per year to be the default search engine on iPhones. It’s lucrative for Apple and a valuable way for Google to get more search volume and users.

Apple’s SVP of Services Eddy Cue testified Wednesday that Apple chooses to feature Google because it’s “the best search engine.”

The DOJ also proposed the company divest its Chrome browser but that was not included in Reid’s initial calculation, the source confirmed.

Reid on Tuesday said Google’s proprietary “Knowledge Graph” database, which it uses to surface search results, contains more than 500 billion facts, according to the source, and that Google has invested more than $20 billion in engineering costs and content acquisition over more than a decade.

“People ask Google questions they wouldn’t ask anyone else,” she said, according to the source.

Reid echoed Google’s argument that sharing its data would create privacy risks, the source confirmed.

Closing arguments for the search remedies trial will take place May 29th and 30th, followed by the judge’s decision expected in August.

The company faces a separate remedies trial for its advertising tech business, which is scheduled to begin Sept. 22.

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