Quikr merger: CommonFloor sees job cuts

BENGALURU: The costly acquisition of CommonFloor by online classifieds firm Quikr is taking a toll on the former’s employees. Quikr, which paid around $100 million for the real estate inventory aggregator, is laying off more than 150 CommonFloor employees. The process had started in February and many CommonFloor employees have left the company since then.

CommonFloor had 1,000 employees around the time of the merger, while Quikr had 350 employees in its real estate division and its total employee count was 1,600. The real estate division is the single largest revenue contributor for Quikr, which has roughly $30 million in overall annual revenue.

When asked about the layoffs, Quikr emailed the following statement to TOI: “Bengaluru will now serve as the main hub for all business functions of both Quikr and CommonFloor. As part of the overall integration exercise, we have been analysing all our assets and believe it is best to consolidate our physical as well as people assets based on our business needs.” Quikr had moved its headquarters from Mumbai to Bengaluru last year. CommonFloor did not comment.



Quikr, which has more than 30 million visitors, was the leading online real estate company before the merger. But while Quikr was more of a listing platform, CommonFloor had better descriptions and search options and even a Google Glass solution that allowed a user to experience virtual tours of a property, all of which perhaps provided a better user experience.



As part of the restructuring, CommonFloor will vacate its office by the end of this month and the employees will move to Quikr’s office. Quikr has said it will invest Rs 250 crore in the real estate division.