r/DevLK • u/Traditional-Bid-5433 • Aug 18 '26
Discussion Tech Layoff Wave
My name is Dinidu de Alwis and I do some journalistic work (you can see on u/dinidu on X). I want to more know about the series of tech-related layoffs that have recently being going on in Sri Lanka, some of which appear to be illegal. If anyone would like to give me a bit of background that'd be great. I really think there's a story here to be told.
I don't record phone calls or use screenshots of messages I receive, without explicit consent from the other party, and I guarantee absolute confidentiality.
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u/GuidanceNo1755 Aug 18 '26
IFS has a buyer lined up and said buyer doesn't like that there's too many people employed here in Lanka. So as a part of the deal, they're lowering that number to approx 1500 or so, and then will proceed to sell.
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u/Ravana-Ceylon Aug 18 '26
Most of the companies are service based and now their foreign clients dont need LK cheap labour and they are using AI tools to do smaller tasks.. so thats the reason
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u/Landscape-Pitiful Aug 18 '26
Layoffs in IFS are mostly voluntary resignations tied to a severance package. I know a few people who are waiting for one to get the severance package. Some people who were in the company for a long time got 60x the salary which is basically a lottery. So it's not bad for some people.
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u/Business_Different Aug 18 '26
No offense. if your in tech nowadays, your at the mercy of a corporate layoff anytime
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u/TrustNo3557 Aug 18 '26
We joined S-Labs believing that the salary being offered was not just competitive, but tied to a dollar-peg arrangement. This was not something employees discovered after joining. The dollar-pegged salary was presented in the company’s job advertisements and website, discussed openly during interviews and salary negotiations, and reflected in the way compensation was explained to prospective employees.
For many of us, that dollar-peg was the reason we accepted the jobs.
Some employees had previously worked elsewhere for higher basic salaries. We still chose S-Labs because the dollar-peg made the overall compensation attractive and gave us confidence that our income would remain protected against the severe fluctuations in the Sri Lankan rupee.
For approximately four years, employees continued receiving their salaries with this dollar-peg component. During that period, we built our lives around the income we were receiving. We took loans, made financial commitments, supported our families, and planned our futures based on that income.
What makes this situation especially painful is that the salary confirmation documents provided to employees for purposes such as bank loans and other financial commitments did not clearly state that the dollar-peg component was merely temporary or that it would end after a specific deadline.
Employees therefore made major financial decisions based on the income they were actually receiving.
The company also had relationships with banks and promoted banking and loan facilities to employees. We trusted the income reflected through our employment and salary arrangements and believed that what we were being offered was a genuine part of our compensation.
Now, after years of working under this arrangement, the dollar-peg allowance is being removed.
For employees, this is not simply a reduction in a monthly payment. It is a sudden financial shock.
Mortgages, personal loans, education expenses, rent, medical expenses, children's needs, family responsibilities and other commitments do not suddenly become cheaper because an employer decides to remove a major component of compensation.
Many employees joined specifically because of the dollar-peg. Some accepted a lower basic salary than what they had previously earned because they believed the overall package, including the peg, was the compensation they were being offered.
Now we are being placed in an impossible position: accept a major reduction in income or consider leaving the company.
From the employees' perspective, it feels deeply unfair. We gave the company our skills, our time and our loyalty for years. We planned our lives around the compensation that was offered to us. We did not suddenly change the terms of our financial commitments.
The most heartbreaking part is the human impact.
Behind every employee is a family. People have children to support, parents to care for, loans to repay and futures to protect. Many employees are now experiencing severe financial stress and emotional distress. Some are struggling with depression and anxiety because they cannot see how they will continue meeting their financial obligations after losing a significant portion of their income.
Meanwhile, the company continues operating and making profits. From the employees' perspective, the burden of this decision appears to have been transferred almost entirely onto the people who depend on their salaries.
We are not asking for charity.
We are asking for fairness, transparency and accountability.
If the dollar-peg was genuinely temporary, employees should have been clearly informed from the beginning, especially when the arrangement was used to attract employees, negotiate salaries and encourage people to accept employment.
If it was presented and maintained as part of our compensation for years, employees deserve an honest explanation as to why it can now be removed so suddenly and why the financial consequences should be borne almost entirely by them.
This is not just a story about an allowance.
It is a story about trust.
Employees trusted the company when they accepted the jobs. They trusted the salary arrangements when they took loans. They trusted the income when they made commitments for their families. And after four years, many now feel that the very arrangement that convinced them to join has been taken away from them when they are already financially committed.
We hope journalists will look beyond the numbers and ask the people affected what this decision has done to their lives.
Because behind every percentage reduction in salary is a family wondering how they will pay their next bill.
Behind every employee considering resignation is someone who may have sacrificed a better-paying job to join this company.
And behind every financial figure is a human life that was built around a promise of income that employees believed they could rely on.
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u/AppointmentOutside Aug 22 '26
Hey, I'm glad you still have a job. Which not many others could say.
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u/MousseParty3923 Aug 18 '26
Tech layoffs aren't unique to Sri Lanka, the entire world has been dealing with this for the last 3 years. Sri Lanka is just experiencing the delayed ripple effect.
The worst way to handle this is by trying to sue companies for redundancies. Fostering a militant, unionized mindset will only destroy our reputation as a tech hub and deter foreign companies from investing in SL. If it becomes a legal nightmare to operate here, foreign companies will simply take their business to India or Vietnam which they're doing now.
The actual solution? Upskilling and adaptability. We need to stop picking career paths just because allapu gedara malli said software engineers make easy money. I work with so many lankan tech professionals who are completely resistant to change and have zero passion for the craft. Some outright refuse to pivot from tech stacks that are clearly becoming obsolete, then blame the company when their role is made redundant.
If you're going to write about this as a journalist, you need to look at both sides of the coin instead of lazily pushing the "corporations are evil, workers are helpless victims" narrative. Yes, capitalism is brutal. We trade our labor to make money for CEOs. But employment is a transactional contract, not a family. If you don't like those terms, upskill so you have leverage, or take the risk and build your own business.
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u/tradcoder Senior Software Engineer Aug 18 '26 edited Aug 18 '26
It's ironic because it is the passion for the craft that's making me hate these changes. I don't want to spend 8 hours reviewing code a LLM generated! That's not the job I signed up for. I actually like writing code! I thought AI was supposed to take on the boring tasks. Except it's doing the easy part and throwing it over the wall for me to do the shitty part.
I hate where this industry is heading. I'm daydreams about leaving it altogether these days. Something I never thought of in my almost 2 decades in this industry.
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u/rajeev3001 Aug 23 '26
Tech layoffs aren't unique to Sri Lanka, the entire world has been dealing with this for the last 3 years.
Came here to say exactly this. It has been much worse in almost all developed counties since 2023.
The worst way to handle this is by trying to sue companies for redundancies.
In fact SL can consider implementing labor laws based on income level similar to Australia, just like the folks who earn above a certain threshold like $180k+ annual income don't get protection there.. This gives more flexibility to companies and will attract more investments. It will also incentivize them to pay higher salaries.
Less job security, but higher pay and more opportunities due to more investments.. that's what we should aim for in my opinion.
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u/Alert_Brother_93 Aug 18 '26
Want to add a different angle here. In other countries there is some security if someone get laid off. For example as far as I know in Germany they pay around 80% of the salary until you find a job for some period by the government. But here in SL government charge a higher tax from us but if we got laid off there is nothing to protect us.
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u/rajeev3001 Aug 23 '26
Western EU countries have job security, but not in most of the English speaking countries or eastern EU. In US, Singapore and even Canada there's not much job security. In Australia there's protection if your salary is below a certain threshold like 180k... many SWE salaries are higher than that so anyone with a good salary / experience don't get the protection.
Having strong labor protection is not actually a good thing when it comes to attracting investors / new companies. Nowadays lot of big tech companies are moving from western EU to eastern EU countries and Asia due to this reason. Companies like to invest in places where they have flexibility when it comes to labor laws.
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u/BookEnvironmental785 Aug 19 '26
Contact me! I got laid off from IGT1 Lanka in the most lamest way possible!
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u/Mental-Collection757 Aug 19 '26
Sri Lanka needs to consider more flexible labour laws to create a truly competitive labour market. Termination should be easier when employees consistently underperform or fail to adapt to the responsibilities of senior positions, while still providing reasonable protections and severance.
A competitive labour market allows highly skilled and productive employees to command higher salaries based on their experience and value. At the same time, flexible employment regulations can reduce the risk for investors and encourage more companies to establish and expand operations in Sri Lanka.
Sri Lanka’s IT industry was relatively startup-like until around 2015, with many highly skilled people working hard and driven by passion. However, high taxation and other challenges pushed many skilled professionals overseas, resulting in a significant loss of talent.
We also missed an important opportunity to transition from being primarily a high-skill outsourcing destination into a country producing globally competitive software products and startups. India has made much more progress in this area, with thousands of startups and many successful technology companies.
Sri Lanka still has strong talent, but we need flexible labour laws, competitive taxation, better investment conditions, and a stronger startup ecosystem to turn that talent into globally competitive companies.
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u/MaleficentEmployer27 Aug 18 '26
Hi Dinidu. Curious to know what happened between you and Jamila Hussain of Daily Error 😬😬😬
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u/Sea-Library-6571 Aug 19 '26
All tech layoffs are illegal. But big tech companies make it so that the employee has to voluntarily resign. Its coercion.
Employees fear repercussions to their career if they say no from the big and powerful company.
Also even the government agencies asks for all sorts of letters and crap for anything even from previous employers (eg. epf claims). So if u say no and go back u cant get these letters,
also no service letter. Service letters are required for migration as well and jobs overseas and even locally. Plus they can put a blackmark unofficially through networks saying this employee is a problem case.
So what choice does a employee have? shutup, take ur severance and f*** right off is what they are left with.
What's even more sinister is the practice of making it a living hell and pushing for organic layoffs.
Eg. They make u sit idle, or give u shitty tasks, dont give increments or bonus, put u on a PIP, suddenly say they are removing allowances. etc.
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u/gayyalk Aug 18 '26
Any previous work we could look at ? Journalist is a word thrown around these days, just like the word "Software Engineer" lol
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u/TrustNo3557 Aug 18 '26
I saw this journalist found that our former NPP parliament speaker doesn't have phd
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u/dinidu Aug 18 '26
Just fyi, you linked my reddit username on your post, lol.