The tech giant Apple is laying off over 600 of its workers across several Santa Clara, California, locations, marking its first major workforce reduction since the pandemic began.

According to KTVU, the dismissed employees hail from diverse departments including product design, hardware development, and software engineering.

An official filing with California's Employment Development Department (EDD) indicated that the layoffs would become effective on May 27. The filing under the state’s Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act was submitted by Apple's lawyers last week, and KTVU obtained a copy of this report through a public records request, although specifics on which departments or projects were affected were not disclosed.

Speculation from tech experts pinpoints that many of these workers were part of Apple's 'Project Titan,' an initiative dedicated to developing self-driving vehicles

"It's clear that making more complex, different types of products is hard," freelance technology reporter Ian Sherr told KTVU.

"Artificial intelligence, by comparison, is very much within the wheelhouse of Apple making software. So, in a lot of ways, it makes more sense to put more effort toward that."

The move came as something of a surprise, with Apple previously standing as an exception in a tech sector that's been increasingly tightening its belt.

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