Employer-of-record providers Workstream and Remofirst announced funding rounds as did Tatio, a firm that rates potential employees using job experience simulations. In addition, staffing platform Wonolo announced a managed services program, and Microsoft announced layoffs.

Workstream

Workstream, a platform focused on hiring of hourly workers who don’t work at desks, last month announced a $60 million Series B funding round, bringing total funding at the firm to $108 million.

Hans Tung, managing partner of GGV Capital, led the round.

Workstream enables hiring companies to post to 25,000 job boards and engage with candidates via two-way text messaging. It also enables users to get 30-second video intros from candidates and scheduling of candidate interviews, among other things.

“Workstream has seen tremendous momentum in the last year,” Tung said. “We’re excited to see Workstream continue to expand into new verticals, in particular the retail sector, which was profoundly impacted by Covid.”

The San Francisco-based company previously announced a $48 million funding round in August 2021.

Remofirst

Employer-of-record services provider Remofirst last month announced a $14.1 million seed funding round co-led by Mouro Capital and QED Investors with participation from Counterpart Ventures, according to a post by co-founder and CEO Nursayl Serik.

Remofirst was launched in 2021 by Volodymyr Fedoriv and Serik with the aim of making EOR affordable.

“Before Remofirst, Volodymyr and I both founded multiple remote-first companies and felt that one of our biggest challenges was hiring people around the world in a compliant way,” Serik wrote. “We knew it was more affordable to be remote-first, but we didn’t know why global payroll was so difficult with legacy solutions. This motivated us to tackle the industry and build something that we could use ourselves.”

TaTiO

Tatio, a company that puts candidates through job experience simulations and then provides a potential employer with a job-specific prediction score, announced a $5.3 million seed funding round.

It was led by Mensch Capital Partners and Cresson Management.

“On average, an employer will receive 250 applications for each job position, while the average time spent looking at a résumé is a mere five to seven seconds,” Tatio CEO Maya Hubert said. “There is an ever-growing need for companies to find vetted, qualified employees. While the current method of job hiring is outdated, ineffective and often biased. With Tatio, we’ve created a new way to hire — instead of vetting people out, we vet them in.”

Hubert founded the company with Mor Panfil.

Wonolo

Wonolo, an online staffing platform, launched a managed services program to support businesses in managing job postings.

With the platform, Wonolo’s managed services support team will manage job postings and administrative work based on business needs, direction and feedback. Business will also be able to create a list of preferred workers to invite back for future jobs.

Microsoft layoffs

Microsoft Corp. announced layoffs across multiple divisions on Monday, according to media reports, joining many other tech firms that have cut staff in the unsettled economy.

Microsoft declined to say how many jobs had been cut, but a source told Axios that the layoffs numbered under 1,000.

“Like all companies, we evaluate our business priorities on a regular basis, and make structural adjustments accordingly. We will continue to invest in our business and hire in key growth areas in the year ahead,” the tech giant said in a statement to Axios.

The move is yet another example of large tech companies cutting jobs after earlier moving to slow or freeze hiring as the broader economy cools, Axios reported. Nearly all the major tech firms have slowed headcount growth, with many freezing all but essential hires. A number of companies have already moved to cut jobs, including Snap and Flipboard.

Microsoft has not said how many people had been laid off, nor which departments were impacted. However, The Washington Post reported layoffs affected the wargame simulation division and the Xbox gaming division.

Microsoft had 221,000 employees as of June 30, an increase of 40,000 people or 22% from the same point the prior year, GeekWire reported. It was the largest annual increase in employment in Microsoft’s history, based on data tracked by GeekWire.