CEO George Kurtz cites AI influence in future of company.
CrowdStrike has announced it will cut its workforce by five percent, approximately 500 positions
In a regulatory filing from CEO George Kurtz, he claims that to keep earning customer trust, “we are evolving how we operate” and this is causing the company to “realign parts of our business to continue scaling with focus and discipline.”
Whilst it will continue to ‘prudently’ hire, Kurtz confirmed the company will begin meeting with affected employees over the coming days. “I know this is difficult news and it affects all of us. These decisions were made with care and guided by a clear view of where we need to go.”
AI Evolution
Kurtz said that “with AI reshaping every industry, accelerating threats, and evolving customer needs” the company is evolving how it operates, CrowdStrike is building on what works, simplifying execution, and doubling down on its highest-impact opportunities.
He said: “As we evolve, we are laser-focused on transforming cybersecurity. We stop breaches. This mission defines our purpose, unites our team, and keeps us focused on what matters most: protecting our customers. Our responsibility is aligning our mission with customer, market, and business needs.
“I’ve never been more optimistic about our future as I am right now. What I know, and what I believe the market knows, is that in an AI-accelerated society, the world needs CrowdStrike more than ever.”
Jeff Pollard, VP and principal analyst at Forrester, said Kurtz’s mention of AI likely came from some AI-related efficiency gains, but noted there’s also an industrywide trend at play.
“Some amount of AI-washing is now prevalent in every one of these announcements and this is no exception,” he told Cyberscoop. “In much the same way that ‘we take privacy and security very seriously’ can be found in every breach disclosure, so too can ‘AI productivity’ in workforce reduction announcements.”
Written by
Dan Raywood is a B2B journalist with 25 years of experience, including covering cybersecurity for the past 17 years. He has extensively covered topics from Advanced Persistent Threats and nation-state hackers to major data breaches and regulatory changes.
He has spoken at events including 44CON, Infosecurity Europe, RANT Forum, BSides Scotland, Steelcon and the National Cyber Security Show, and served as editor of SC Media UK, Infosecurity Magazine and IT Security Guru. He was also an analyst with 451 Research and a product marketing lead at Tenable.
