A more subdued volume of biopharma layoffs continued into the third quarter of 2026, validating predictions that the sector has moved beyond the avalanche of redundancies experienced last year.
Fierce reported on 21 announcements from biopharmas about layoffs in their business between July and September. This was only slightly above the 17 announcements for the second quarter and two-thirds of the 33 reports in the first three months of this year.
The largest announcement in the most recent quarter was Novo, which disclosed at its Capital Markets Day last week that a further 4,000 employees had been laid off across the business as part of a long-running cost-cutting exercise that had already seen 9,000 employees lose their jobs.
However, while this entry has been included in the list, Fierce has been unable to confirm with the company whether these redundancies actually took place during the quarter.
Even taking into account Novo’s unexpected disclosure, the figures for the third quarter continue a notable recovery from last year when Fierce reported 64 and 62 layoff announcements in the second and third quarters, respectively. A separate Fierce analysis previously found that over the course of 2025, the 17 pharma companies with at least $20 billion in annual revenue collectively cut more than 22,000 positions.
A recent report by trade group MassBio noted that biopharma R&D jobs in Massachusetts shrunk by around 3,600 roles over the course of 2025—equivalent to a 3.1% reduction. This marked the first annual decline in more than two decades, the report’s authors pointed out.
Angela Stewart, vice president, science and clinical recruiting at recruitment agency Kelly Science, Engineering, Technology & Telecom, acknowledged that there had been a “trough” of layoffs last year, but the agency is “starting to see signs of recovery.”
“Certainly, we are seeing positive signs that would indicate that things are in an upward trajectory for 2026,” Stewart told Fierce.
“We are seeing demand persist in some of the traditional biotech hubs like California and Massachusetts, but we're also seeing hubs within Texas, North Carolina and the Midwest really grow, which is exciting for us,” she added.
Echoing comments that industry observers made to Fierce last quarter, Stewart said she hadn't detected increased use of AI as a trigger for layoffs.
“We're not seeing technical positions going away due to AI, or that companies are redefining current roles with an AI component,” she explained. Instead, managers are “starting to look for individuals who have the AI knowledge and skills alongside the scientific or clinical discipline.”
“There has been a creation of new roles [and] certainly new titles within these organizations,” Stewart added. “For instance, AI drug discovery scientist—that was something we didn't see many years ago.”
Even with layoffs remaining relatively subdued, the third quarter was a particularly tough time to work at a Big Pharma’s New Jersey headquarters, with Novartis, Bristol Myers Squibb and Merck & Co. shedding 322 roles, 265 roles and 54 roles, respectively, from their locations in the Garden State.
Meanwhile, the quarter saw the first significant workforce reduction at Sanofi since new CEO Belén Garijo took charge, with 229 employees laid off from the French pharma’s 2025 acquisition of Blueprint Medicines. When Fierce asked in July whether more layoffs were likely as Garijo attempted to right the Sanofi ship, Chief Financial Officer François Roger would only say that the company had “many initiatives of cost efficiencies across the organization.”
For smaller startups, layoffs were often tied to disappointments in the clinic. Sionna Therapeutics waved goodbye to almost half its workforce following the failure of its closely watched cystic fibrosis add-on program, while Kolon TissueGene let go of 37 employees after a phase 3 knee osteoarthritis failure.
In other cases, reductions in headcount continued to be linked to a pivot in clinical focus, such as TScan Therapeutics’ decision to reduce its workforce by 75% while pausing its hematological and autoimmune assets to prioritize its preclinical solid tumor programs. Lisata Therapeutics laid off 72% of its workforce after its planned merger with Kuva Labs fell apart—although the biotech has since found a future with Marea Therapeutics.
In an encouraging sign, Fierce only had confirmation of one biotech closing down during the three-month period. Arpeggio Biosciences’ CEO revealed on LinkedIn that the company’s leadership had “made the difficult decision to wind down” in July as its Nrf2 program had begun to “unravel.”
Will Maddox contributed to this reporting