Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
I recently received a screenshot from a friend who was unfortunately part of the twenty five percent affected by recent layoffs at Prusa 3D. I'm sure many others can confirm that this screenshot is legitimate.
Unfortunately, the screenshot is in Czech, so I’ve translated it into English:
Hi!
I have an important message for you today that I am not writing easily. But it is necessary. Over the past few years, our team has been growing every year with new colleagues, and we are currently 1144 people. The company has grown, but with many new projects, our team grew as well - and faster than the business itself. We have reached a situation where our costs are increasing faster than our revenues. And that no longer makes sense.
At the same time, we are in a situation where, since the beginning of the year, we have not been meeting sales targets even by 90%. With high fixed costs, increasing competition, a drop in the value of the dollar, and other factors that we can’t all influence, it’s quite an unfavorable combination. We are all, of course, looking forward to INDX, but as part of this year’s plans, there are also other important products that, like INDX, are not yet ready - so they might be delayed, further threatening our ability to meet targets. Overall, we are taking on unnecessarily large risks, and it is necessary to address this.
Part of the next steps will be, among other things, a reduction in the number of positions. It’s a difficult decision, but we are making it to stabilize the company. This will inevitably impact the composition of some teams in Prague and the associated downsizing. The exception is operator positions - there, we are continuously optimizing efficiency and are currently in line with sales targets, so no major changes are planned there.I know you have a lot of questions right now. Each of you will learn about this in the coming days from your team leaders.
At the same time, we are starting to implement a more general cost control process. This will happen gradually over the next weeks and months, and the measures will be the same for all companies. The goal is simple - to bring our margins back to where they were in 2024.We have never done anything like this before. But it is a normal thing that companies that grow rapidly must occasionally do to stay healthy.And one last thing - I honestly admit that we should have addressed this situation last year. We hoped that our plans would be met, but hope is not hard data, which is what we should have been following. We misjudged it, and that’s our mistake, from which we are learning. At the same time, we are still very optimistic for this year, thanks to the arrival of INDX and the general push toward local manufacturing self-sufficiency. We just need to be as well-prepared as possible.
Ondřej and Josef (the one from the USA)
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
Since investing in a MK4 a few years ago I wondered how they could keep competing with Bambu etc and stay profitable. It does make me question whether they will stay viable in the consumer space. However, over-growth and subsequent down-sizing is standard practice in smaller companies so I'm not surprised.
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
That's the pits, but I'm old enough to have seen it multiple times. Without getting into politics, the world is a bit of a mess right now and it affects literally everything, not only supply chain costs and shipping costs, but the willingness of worried people to buy non-essential goods. And, let's face it, you buy food and pay the rent before buying 3D printers. Hopefully things will improve at some point, and we can get on an upward trend again.
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
It is disappointing to read that 2025 was already a bad year for Prusa, worse than 2024. With the Core One just released and in full production throughout the year, that should have been a "comeback" year for them.
Let's hope that INDX can actually move the needle somewhat, and that the reduced R&D bandwidth does not hurt other key product launches. PrusaSlicer 3.0 seems critical to catch up in terms of usability, and maybe innovation. (Whatever that "HD slicing" actually is...)
I am not sure whether a move to higher-end, semi-professional printers would be able to carry the company. There's less Chinese competition and less pricing pressure, but significantly smaller unit numbers there. I think Prusa will have to look for cost reduction measures that can translate into reduced sales prices -- outsourcing some manufacturing steps, buying lower-cost components? But with all the investments into PCB production, injection molding etc. already made, it may be difficult to turn this around.
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
Upsetting news, but on the cards with companies like Bambu breaking into the market with their beginner friendly models at comparatively cheap prices. People just want to print rather then tinker, and Bambu do have that cracked. Is a shame though, I still have a soft spot for my Prusa machines, and their support is still some of the best in the industry IMO.
The INDX system is late - just like their Core One was. It allowed the competition time to get into that space and establish themselves with 'neat' solutions. I do hope the INDX system does well, but I fear a fair chuck of multi material/color users have gone the AMS route by now, which just seems to work, without any upgrading/tinkering.......
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
[...] I think Prusa will have to look for cost reduction measures that can translate into reduced sales prices -- [...].
...reading some posts on Reddit, like https://www.reddit.com/r/prusa3d/comments/1rv53yk/i_really_like_prusa_printers_but_the_new_price_of/ ...it might be a wishful thinking...
Core One L
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
Huh, I think I would notice 25% leaving any team. This is flat out not true. The company didn't do an optimization of its operations any time before, so the first reshuffle was actually welcomed as a healthy step. I'm sorry that someone feels the need to spin internal communications to hurt the rest of the team. Well, don't let the facts get in the way of a bombshell story 😀
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
The INDX system is late - just like their Core One was. It allowed the competition time to get into that space and establish themselves with 'neat' solutions. I do hope the INDX system does well, but I fear a fair chuck of multi material/color users have gone the AMS route by now, which just seems to work, without any upgrading/tinkering.......
Core One, INDX, Universal Storage boxes, Prusa Slicer 3.0 were or are all late -- not necessarily vs. announced ship dates, but vs. the competition. As mentioned, having to lay off developers due to cost pressure is not necessarily helpful in that situation. Hopefully Prusa have some nice-to-have projects in the pipeline which they can defer, so the critical new stuff comes out very soon.
With INDX, Vortek and the cheap toolchanger from Snapmaker hitting the market, I can see many people replacing their AMS-based Bambu printers. The new approaches not only deliver much faster prints, but also a waste reduction which those who print a lot will certainly notice in their expenses. But how much of those replacement sales will be coming Prusa's way? Fingers crossed!
RE: Prusa 3D lays off nearly twenty five percent of developers due to financial issues
Huh, I think I would notice 25% leaving any team. This is flat out not true. The company didn't do an optimization of its operations any time before, so the first reshuffle was actually welcomed as a healthy step. I'm sorry that someone feels the need to spin internal communications to hurt the rest of the team. Well, don't let the facts get in the way of a bombshell story 😀
Well, of course this would go public -- you did not expect to keep it under wraps, right? I think Prusa's best course of action would be to publish an official announcement which states the facts, on the blog maybe.
Claiming that this was "welcomed as a healthy step" sounds rather cynical. I am pretty sure that those who got laid off are not welcoming it so much.