Salesforce's new data and AI hires are coming from areas of the country with 'high talent pools, low cost of living'

• Salesforce headcount increased to 72,682 workers in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2024. 
• The company laid off 10% of its workforce, which had reached nearly 80,000 employees, last year. 
• CEO Marc Benioff has said he intends to hire 3,000 people as it increases focus on AI. 

Just a year after Salesforce laid off nearly 10% of its workforce, the company's head count is beginning to creep back up.

The enterprise software company reported it had 72,682 employees as of January 31, up from 70,843 at the end of the prior quarter, according to its form 8-K filed this week with the SEC.

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff has previously said he plans to hire more people as the company shifts its focus to generative artificial intelligence. He has even encouraged former employees — "boomerangs," as he calls them — to come back.

"We're investing into our most productive areas — AI and data," CFO Amy Weaver said this week on the company's fourth-quarter earnings call with investors.

Salesforce laid off roughly 8,000 people in 2023 as part of a broader restructuring effort to increase profit margins. The company reported a non-GAAP operating margin of 30.5% for the fiscal year, above the 30% threshold that activist investors had pushed for.

New hires, Weaver said, are being added to Salesforce in "cost-effective ways," such as hiring people from areas that have "high talent pools and low cost of living."

If that sounds familiar, that's because it might be.

In late 2022, Business Insider reported that Oracle — the software company where Benioff started his sales career, still helmed by his mentor Larry Ellison — had started to avoid hiring in cities known for high salaries, such as New York and San Francisco.

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