--- title: "CEO Fires 90 Percent of Support Staff, Saying AI Outperforms Them" description: "A 31-year-old CEO of an e-commerce platform fired 90 percent of the company's support staff after arguing an AI chatbot outperformed them." date: "2023-07-12" modified: "2023-07-12" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/ceo-fires-90-percent-support-staff-ai" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" tags: - "ai chatbot" - "job automation" - "the digest" --- # CEO Fires 90 Percent of Support Staff, Saying AI Outperforms Them ![A 31-year-old CEO of an e-commerce platform fired 90 percent of the company's support staff after arguing an AI chatbot outperformed them.]() *Futuristic male cyborg, \Image: Getty Images\* ## Tough But Necessary Suumit Shah, a 31-year-old CEO of an e-commerce platform called Dukaan based in India, is getting torn to shreds online for firing 90 percent of the company's customer support staff after arguing that an AI chatbot had outperformed them. It was an unusually callous announcement that clearly didn't sit well with plenty of netizens, as [*Insider* reports](). "We had to layoff \[sic\] 90 percent of our support team because of this AI chatbot," he [tweeted](). "Tough? Yes. Necessary? Absolutely." In a [lengthy Twitter thread]() laden with screenshots from action movies such as "iRobot" and "Limitless," Shah argued that response times plummeted from over two hours to less than two minutes thanks to the AI chatbot. ## Talk to the Bot But not everybody is buying the CEO's excuse for laying off dozens of employees, allegedly cutting his customer support budget to just $100 a month. "Make no mistake," one Twitter user [wrote](). "The support team was laid off here because business is failing and funding is dry. Not because of AI." Others pointed out the quality of Dukaan's customer service plummeted as well. "It wasn’t answering as I needed it to," another user [wrote](). "I tried tweaking my questions several ways because I know it was a bot. It just didn’t reply properly. It left me frustrated and ultimately didn’t bother renewing my premium plan." "I'm terrified of the future where we will never speak to a human again in customer support which means we will never get a problem solved you'll just be passed around between bots," one [Redditor wrote](). ## No Ragrets Shah, however, told *Insider* that he had no choice — though he did say he regretted posting about the layoffs on social media. "Over time, everybody will start doing this," he said. "It's not just us. Maybe I'm just too straightforward to have put it on Twitter." And of course, he's not entirely wrong. Plenty of [tech]() [companies]() have announced layoffs while also making huge investments in AI tech, [*Insider* pointed out](). The prognosis is pretty grim as well, with [researchers warning]() that plenty more jobs will be taken away from humans and given to bots in the near future. But gloating about laying off most of your customer support staff on Twitter isn't just inhumane. It also shows how little tech CEOs like Shah actually care about the people that work for them. **More on AI layoffs:** *[Insider Lays Off 10 Percent of Staff After Announcing Pivot to AI]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()