General Motors cuts more than 10% of IT staff to pivot toward AI

General Motors has laid off more than 10% of its Information Technology department, affecting about 600 salaried employees. The layoffs, first reported by Bloomberg News and confirmed by GM, are part of a deliberate strategy to swap existing roles for talent focused on artificial intelligence. In an emailed statement, the automaker framed the restructuring as a forward-looking transition: “GM is transforming its Information Technology organization to better position the company for the future.” According to a person familiar with the layoffs, the company is actively hiring for IT roles requiring different skills. The most sought-after capabilities include data engineering and analytics, cloud-based engineering, agent and model development, new AI workflows, prompt engineering—the practice of optimizing inputs for AI models—and AI-native development, which involves building AI systems from the ground up by designing systems, training models, and engineering pipelines.

The cuts are part of a broader restructuring effort at the automaker over the past 18 months, during which GM has laid off white-collar employees across several departments to focus resources on high-priority initiatives, including AI. As part of this shift, the company previously cut about 1,000 software workers in August 2024.

GM’s software division has experienced significant leadership turnover since May 2025, when the company hired Sterling Anderson, co-founder of the autonomous trucking startup Aurora, as chief product officer. Last November, three top executives left the software team as Anderson pushed to consolidate GM’s disparate technology businesses into one organization. Those departures included Baris Cetinok, former senior vice president of software and services product management; Dave Richardson, former senior vice president of software and services engineering; and Barak Turovsky, a former Cisco executive who spent just nine months as GM’s chief AI officer. To fill these gaps, GM has brought on new AI-focused leadership. In October, the company hired Behrad Toghi, formerly of Apple, as its AI lead. It also appointed Rashed Haq as vice president of autonomous vehicles. Haq previously spent five years as head of AI and robotics at Cruise, the self-driving vehicle company acquired and later shuttered by GM.

Why it matters

GM’s restructuring is a signal of what enterprise AI adoption actually looks like in practice — not just adding AI tools on top of existing teams, but deliberately rebuilding the workforce from the ground up.