Spotify plans to lay off roughly 6% of its staff as part of its response to an economic downturn, a plan that also included the departure of a key business executive.

The company had roughly 9,800 employees across all markets in September of last year.

In a note shared with staff that was posted to Spotify’s website, CEO Daniel Ek said the moves were the result of the company working to reduce costs and improve efficiency, something the company “[hasn’t] focused on as much” but was important in a challenging economic environment.

The layoffs came with what Ek described as a restructuring that would result in Gustav Söderström leading all engineering and platform work as chief product officer and Alex Norström overseeing all business elements as chief business officer. This is also resulting in chief content and advertising business officer Dawn Ostroff leaving the company.

Ostroff, a former president at Conde Nast Entertainment, joined Spotify in 2018. She has been credited with leading the platform’s push to expand its share of the podcasting market, with acquisitions of media companies like Gimlet, The Ringer and Parcast happening on her watch, as well as adtech and analytics companies Megaphone, Podsights and Chartable. She also oversaw major partnerships with the likes of Joe Rogan.

In his statement, Ek also credited Ostroff for helping to innovate the podcast ad format and doubling Spotify’s ad revenue to €1.5 billion.

Spotify has yet to release its full-year financial results for 2022, but according to the company’s reporting for Q3, users and revenue continued to grow in both its premium and ad-supported tier. However, its operating loss swelled, which the company attributed to increased expenses associated with increasing the headcount on its ad sales team and as the result of acquisitions, as well as marketing costs associated with the company’s growth priorities.

“Like many other leaders, I hoped to sustain the strong tailwinds from the pandemic and believed that our broad global business and lower risk to the impact of a slowdown in ads would insulate us,” Ek said in his note. “In hindsight, I was too ambitious in investing ahead of our revenue growth.”

Spotify is also joining Google and Microsoft as the latest tech companies to announce major layoffs. While the job losses have hit many corners of the sector since last summer, they have been particularly impactful at tech companies reliant on advertising revenue as brands pull back spending amid an economic downturn.