Bird cut about 20% of its staff, and its founder told them tasks that needed dedicated headcount no longer do because of AI

Bird, the Dutch business-messaging company formerly called MessageBird, reduced its headcount by "approximately 20%" on 11 May 2026, founder Robert Vis wrote in a note to all staff that he then published. Most of the cuts are in Europe, and he gave no number. He named two causes and kept them separate. "The first is geography. Our engineering and operations teams were built for a company headquartered in Amsterdam, and our customers in 2026 are increasingly not," he wrote. "The second is AI. It has changed how we work, and tasks that required dedicated headcount even a few years ago no longer do." Bird is still hiring in the United States. So this is one cut with two stated reasons and no way to tell how many jobs belong to each. What makes it worth recording is the second sentence: an employer saying, in writing and to the people affected, that the work no longer needs them.