Fintech unicorn Brex set to close Israel R&D center as part of global layoffs
Fintech unicorn Brex set to close Israel R&D center as part of global layoffs
The over 20 Brex employees in Israel are expected to be laid off or offered roles abroad after the company announced last week that it was cutting 20% of its global staff
Fintech startup Brex is planning to close its Israel R&D center as part of the global layoffs it announced last week. Brex only set up the center two-and-a-half years ago when it acquired Israeli startup Weav for $50 million. The center employs around 20 people in total.
Brex announced last week that it was cutting 20% of its global staff, or 282 employees. "Looking inward, I realized we grew our org too quickly, making it harder to move at the speed we once did. This year, we decided to take a hard look at our current structure, and reduce the number of layers between leaders and the actual work that affects customers," founder and co-CEO Pedro Franceschi wrote.
The San Francisco-based Brex offers credit cards, business cash accounts, spend management, and bill pay software together in a single dashboard. It was valued at $12.3 billion when it raised an additional $300 million in a Series D-2 round in January 2022. Since the company’s founding in 2017, Brex has raised a total of $1.2 billion from investors.
Brex set up an R&D center in Israel on the back of Weav’s infrastructure and led by Weav CEO Nadav Lidor. Weav, was founded in 2020 by Avikam Agur, Nadav Lidor, and Ambika Acharya.
Following the acquisition of Weav, Brex co-founder Henrique Dubugras told Calcalist that the company “is excited about making additional acquisitions in Israel and are certainly planning to go shopping in the country.” He went on to say that Brex plans to “recruit hundreds of new employees, including in Israel, and complete acquisitions that will accelerate this journey. The future is going to be very interesting.”
